Drew, CBS’ upcoming series in which beloved girl detective Nancy Drew is neither a girl nor a detective, has signed on ER’s Anthony Edwards to play Nancy’s father. CBS’ version of Nancy is an adult New York City cop (because that’s exactly what Carolyn Keene’s beloved series of books is all about), and TV Guide reports that Edwards will play Carson Drew, an attorney whose daughter is decidedly not a small-town teenager who stumbles onto secret passageways behind bookshelves, but will be solving murders in midtown Manhattan every week. Never underestimate CBS’ ability to make a weekly procedural out of even the most unlikely source material.
So, Edwards has essentially signed on to CSI: Misplaced Nostalgia, which has discarded nearly every familiar element of a property presumably resurrected because of its familiar elements. Keene would be rolling over in her grave, except she wasn’t a real person, so maybe our whole childhood was built on a foundation of lies, and nothing CBS does will make a difference.