NBC Does a Netflix with Aquarius

Tomorrow night (May 28th) NBC will premiere its new show Aquarius with David Duchovny, and then make the entire series available online the next day.  Yes, binging on new series is now spreading beyond Netflix and Amazon.  No need to pace yourself, but I am getting ahead of myself since I have not explained Aquarius.  Here is the story:

Sam Hodiak (David Duchovny, "Californication," "The X-Files"), a decorated World War II vet and homicide detective, barely recognizes the city he's now policing. Long hair, cheap drugs, rising crime, protests, free love, police brutality, Black Power and the Vietnam War are radically remaking the world he and the Greatest Generation saved from fascism 20 years ago.

So when Emma Karn (Emma Dumont, "Salvation," "Bunheads"), the 16-year-old daughter of an old girlfriend, goes missing in a sea of hippies and Hodiak agrees to find her, he faces only hostility, distrust and silence. He enlists the help of Brian Shafe (Grey Damon, "True Blood," "Friday Night Lights") - a young, idealistic undercover vice cop who's been allowed to grow his hair out - to infiltrate this new counterculture and find her. 

The generational conflict between the two is immediate and heated, yet they're both dedicated officers and soon realize the need to bring Emma home is more urgent than they foresaw. The immediacy arises because she has joined a small but growing band of drifters under the sway of a career criminal who now dreams of being a rock star: Charles Manson (Gethin Anthony, "Game of Thrones").

Yes, another cop show where the two cops have different personalities, but this time with cool 60s music and Charlie Manson sprinkled in.  How many ways can we dress up the same plot?  I am not sure, but I imagine Hollywood can keep it going.  

Brian Lowry in Variety states:

In making all the episodes available online after its premier, it’s either an interesting experiment, charitably speaking, or an unceremonious dumping of a project whose prospects are, admittedly, uncertain. While the dawning of “Aquarius” is hardly revolutionary, the show does kick off summer with a provocative, cable-like gamble.

I think I will wait for Duchovny on the returning X-Files early next year.   While only 6 episodes long, I know I will get more of a unique program that surpasses much we see on TV these days.