The self-assured, calm and authoritative manner of Jesse L. Martin (series exec producer and star) draws one immediately to an offbeat mystery concept. As a psych professor and extremely inquisitive individual, he explores his psychological theories by investigating real-life mysteries. It's a wonderful dramatic approach and won me over rather quickly.
As Jesse tries to piece together all sorts of disparate clues to come to some feasible theories as to what really happened and whodunit, in this case primarily to solve the murder mystery of a popular social influencer, the audience follows along in the same process. He's shrewd and of course a master of psychology, but unlike say a Columbo, who the audience is given a head start in each episode by the reveal of the culprit at the beginning of the show, here we have the fun of surprise as each clue is resolved according to Jesse's ability to piece together the underlying psych connections. And the gradual revelations about his character Alex's back-story -how he was severely burned in a bombing incident, are most intriguing, i.e., compel one to want to keep tuning in to find out more.
With the delays in launching many new shows caused by the writers and ongoing actors strikes, the playing field is opened for this series to succeed (as flashier and more expensive, large-scale new competition is either delayed or not made) so "The Irrational" logically is set for success in attracting an audience.
