strobesml

Gideon Oliver (1989)

Not what I expected.

Louis Gossett Jr., who plays Gideon Oliver, is as charming and wonderful an actor as I would have hoped. However, as a fan of the Gideon Oliver books by Aaron Elkins, I was disappointed that the TV character was almost nothing like the character in the book.

I know that, in translating a character from one medium to another, some changes are inevitably made. However, I still expect some level of similarity aside from the name. In the books, Dr. Oliver is a physical anthropologist and "Skeleton Detective", who can look at a set of bones and tell, for example, that body came from someone who played a woodwind instrument. In these stories, he is a cultural anthropologist who knows about cultural differences. His wife, Julie, from the books is nowhere to be seen but he was a daughter in the TV series that was not in the book.

None of the recurring characters in the book appear in the series. In short, it is a Gideon Oliver series that is missing everything about Gideon Oliver. If you're a Louis Gossett Jr. Fan (and you certainly should be), he is a strong reason to watch the program. If you are a Gideon Oliver book fan, you will be disappointed.