100 Favorite Shows: #41 — Psych
“It’s a gift that I bust out on rare occasions and almost all the time.”
Psych debuted on the USA Network on July 7, 2006. A seemingly innocuous mystery comedy on basic cable, it skyrocketed in the ratings and was one of the biggest hits of the 2000s on the excess channels. It eventually ran for eight seasons and 120 episodes, riding all the way out to March 2014. It was USA’s longest-running scripted series, until it was eventually eclipsed by Suits. Since then, it’s spawned two spin-off films, one of which debuted this year on Peacock. All of this from a series created by Steve Franks that had fairly low expectations. Due to its goofy sense of humor and compelling, psychic bend to a mystery procedural, Psych developed a cult following that continued to expand well beyond the reach of just its series leads (James Roday Rodriguez, who played Shawn Spencer, and Dulé Hill, who played Burton “Gus” Guster).
(Spoilers for Psych and its two subsequent films are included in this essay. If you don’t want to read them, then don’t be exactly half of an eleven-pound black forest ham.)
Growing up, I was fascinated by magazine covers. Every Wednesday morning, I’d eagerly ask my mother to check the old Sports Illustrated Vault website to see what the latest cover of Sports Illustrated was (the morning it was Dustin Pedroia is still the best morning). Eventually, I became so obsessed with them that I started making my own covers for a fake sports magazine (that had no articles) and, later, a fake entertainment magazine. When the summer rolled around, I’d create a fake “Summer TV Preview” for the latter and because there were very few television debuts in June, July, and August back then, the covers often revolved around USA’s “Characters Welcome” era. It’s one of the nerdier things about me.
This was the period of the USA Network that would send out a number of series every summer with each revolving around a different sub-genre of family viewing. There were medical procedurals (Royal Pains), pseudo-spy thrillers (Burn Notice) and algorithm-spat products (Necessary Roughness). Every summer, billboards would be plastered with the characters walking along the beach, promising a summer of fun for USA.
None of these shows are going to be on the list. They were too innocuous and too repetitive, in spite of the childhood, watching-TV-with-your-parents nostalgia they represent. One show, however, did rise above this era and, obviously, it was Psych. Psych did occasionally fall into procedural trappings (many episodes were about individualized criminals, many of them would also end with guns pointed at Shawn), but for the most part, it approached the genre with a completely different perspective: it was goofy. Psych was a silly outsider that brought a crime-solver with a sixth sense to the genre, changing the sensibility (and the dynamics) immediately. (And yes, Psych came before The Mentalist, as evidenced by the many meta references from the pineapple-oriented series.) It managed to have the occasional arc (Shawn and Jules (Maggie Lawson) dating in secret or the Yin Yang Killers), but it was mostly concerned with taking the piss out of the implausible expediency of many crime series. (Take “Extradition: British Columbia” as an example when Shawn stages a sting just one scene after he comes up with the idea. To this, he laments to Gus, “Don’t I get any credit for planning this whole thing in, like, less than two hours?”)
Psych also had the benefit of being more than just a comedic take on a detective procedural, though; it was vastly more layered than Royal Pains or even Monk, its closest counterpart. Portrayed by Roday Rodriguez, who was a relative unknown at the time (but still indicative of how unknowns can be charming instead of cringey) and delivered a ton of behind-the-scenes writing and producing work, Shawn was not a psychic. He was extremely observant (in “Dual Spires,” he is the only one who thinks to do the twelve times twenty-four math to determine how many residents are missing from the town meeting) and had the memory of an elephant (which he also wants to protect at all costs), but he used these attributes to fool everyone (save for Gus and his father, Henry (Corbin Bernsen)) into thinking he did have a supernatural gift.
Mostly, Shawn conducted himself this way to live out his Sherlock Holmes fantasy (since Psych was on screen instead of the page, clues were highlighted and made clear when elements of the scenes were suspicious), even if he didn’t feel the need to be as self-serious as the kind of detective who smoked a pipe and used words like “elementary” to describe things besides school.
Unlike Sherlock, though, Shawn was often sent along a learning curve that positioned his findings as the result of clue deduction and trial-and-error, even if Holmes was more keen on harnessing the former. Shawn has the benefit of being able to notice details both past (his eidetic memory inherited from his mother (Cybill Shepherd)) and present (his observational skills honed over years by Henry, who taught Shawn to notice how many hats were in any room he enters and to understand that there is no such thing as a perfect crime). However, Shawn does not just merge these skills. He advances the blend by also being much quicker on his feet than either of his parents were capable of being.
The entire character of Shawn Spencer was more alive and energetic than figures like Michael Westen and Adrian Monk, which showed that the USA formula (complete with sixteen episode orders) was not what defined Psych. It was how they operated within that context on an episode-by-episode basis. The mysteries could have been rote on Psych, but instead, the show’s writing staff managed to craft some genuinely engaging puzzles. Just take “Dual Spires” as an example. At first, it seems like the mystery of Paula Merral is just about finding who killed her and dumped her in the communal lake. Instead, Jules’ research finds that Merral was reported drowned seven years ago. Spooky! Mysterious! Hijinks ensue!
Even though Shawn and Gus are technically hired guns for the cases of the Santa Barbara Police Department (courtesy of the some-nonsense-allowed Chief Vick (Kirsten Nelson)), most of the premises seem to begin with victims (or, in some cases, criminals) seeking out Shawn’s psychic talents. This leads to Lassie (Timothy Omundson) and Jules being roped into Shawn’s investigative actions, rather than the other way around. For Jules, she hardly minds, but for Lassie, he takes great offense to the fact that he often seems to be the one working for Shawn.
Lassie is a man who is very passionate about the traditional styles and methodologies of police work he represents. Ultimately, Lassie is a good guy around whom the other characters enjoy being (Jules, as his partner, possesses the closest bond), even if he can embody some of the pompous attitudes typically seen in characters like Scrubs’ Dr. Cox. Despite Lassie’s penchant for by-the-book behavior and his reverence for bona fide, down-home, “American heroes,” like how he sees Big Ed (The Big Show) in “Lassie Jerky,” he also harbors a great deal of trust (perhaps not as much as he should, considering he still tends to doubt Shawn, even in the later seasons) and respect for Shawn and Gus. Lassie is never so prideful that he allows his occasional envy of Shawn’s talents to interfere with the case. For him, the case comes first, no matter who solves it and this allowed for Lassie to become a refreshing reprieve from the typical antagonistic authority figures. By the end of Psych, Lassie is so endeared alongside the rest of the group that the series’ second follow-up film is named for him (Psych 2: Lassie Come Home) as a means of rallying around Omundson, who suffered a debilitating stroke in real life.
Jules, on the other hand, is much more open to Shawn’s unconventional tactics from the beginning. This is partly because she is attracted to Shawn and they eventually end up together, showing that there were still people capable of drawing out a more humanized, romantic side of Shawn Spencer. But it’s also because Jules was just as good a detective as Lassie; she just followed the rules a little differently. Jules is more open to thinking creatively on the job, compared to Lassie, who is a slave to his training. Jules does tend to be much less goofy than Shawn, though (perhaps this is why Lassie connects with Jules from the beginning, despite their alternative approaches), which allows her to be rocked by the consequences of her cases on occasion.
In “Mr. Yin Presents…,” for example, Jules is used as a pawn in a murderous game against Shawn. She maintains her duties as a public protector until she doesn’t have to and she cries in Lassie’s arms. It’s not a sign of weakness, though. It shows that her oppressive work hasn’t broken the humanity within her. The fact that she can be so deeply affected by the torment is evidence that she is the SBPD’s most underrated detective. The world needs more detectives and officers who care.
These grave moments were rare, though. On Psych, silliness manifested in many forms. Whenever Shawn would begin put thoughts together like Lego bricks in his head, he would lean into the physicality of the character and bounce up and down. This bouncing also applied to Gus, who took a turkey leg from a tree and began to rock upon savoring its juices. Come to think of it, Shawn and Gus seemed to have as many celebratory dances coordinated for when they found food as when they found the solutions to their cases. Gus stress eats chocolate and steals Shawn’s honey when he has graham crackers, they immediately jump to snacking when the lights go out in “100 Clues,” and they perpetually steal Jules’ cinnamon pie during Dual Spires’ cinnamon festival.
Gus’ sensitive taste palette is one of the many products from his personality, which is based around being proud of himself and his abilities, as well as being about as cultured as one can be in Santa Barbara. Part of Gus’ pride is also tied to his confidence as a “player” and the belief that he’s one of the state’s most eligible bachelors. Whenever he thinks a woman is into him, he brushes his nose slightly to unleash a seductive snarl and prepares his top notch flirtation anecdote regarding Pluto’s planetary status. This, however, is just one of Gus’ (and Hill’s) many excellent faces, many of which reflect the intense fear he feels almost constantly.
Gus’ feelings range rapidly from stoicism to terror to immense sympathy (Gus is not just a sympathetic crier; he’s a sympathetic everything) and it results in myriad winces, grunts, and screams that are among the most hilarious sounds ever heard on television (the best comes when Shawn and Gus play football).
Gus is also enigmatic for a large portion of Psych. In “Dual Spires,” Shawn finally asks, “What exactly constitutes the difference between altar boy Gus and degenerate Gus?” because his best friend’s opinions are persistent in their unpredictability. He frequently jumps back and forth between being the one who keeps Shawn’s behavior in check to being the one indulging it the most. By the end, Gus is all in with the tricky bits, but he’s still wary of the various scenarios he finds himself embroiled in. (To use yet another example from “Dual Spires,” he pretends to have a stomachache to get into the center of medical attention and when the doctor lubes up a latex glove, he can’t help but raise an eyebrow in fear.)
It’s the very notion of engaging in tricky bits to attack the investigative nature of their crimes that posits Shawn and Gus as distinctly unqualified to be true detectives. Their sense of independence is better suited to freelance psychic investigations, to be sure, but when Lassie and Jules interrogate suspects and witnesses, they follow the rules. When it’s Shawn and Gus, they feel the need to lie at every turn. Is it because they don’t have badges or is it because they’re truly just not adults (but in the best way possible)? After all, the only thing they’re more obsessed with than sweets and toys is the pop culture from their childhood.
They’re always equipped with the most obscure references — from Dave Thomas to Jose Feliciano to René Auberjonois to Efrem Zimbalist — and when they arrive in Dual Spires, Shawn amends his allusive behavior to cater to their sheltered reality by exclusively making comparisons to Everwood. Fortunately, Shawn is aware of the obscurity of many of his statements (“You’re Andrew McCarthy in Pretty in Pink.” “Who’s Andrew McCarthy?” “That’s fair.”) because he feels secure in who he is. His sense of masculinity is far from traditional (and the same goes for Gus), but neither of them have any qualms about their devotion to the 1980s, their schedules including only WrestleMania, and their overriding fear of danger. They’re more than comfortable enough to be who they are, even if they learned how to be that from Shaggy and Scooby-Doo.
Like Shaggy and Scooby-Doo, Shawn and Gus are tag-alongs to the actual professional detectives and they end up falling backwards into successfully solving the crimes while stopping to snack along the way. They differ because Shawn and Gus do have a great deal of agency on their own and they actually have a witty dynamic between them, as opposed to the Mystery Machine stoners whose conversations were often limited to “Sandwich” and “Raggy.” In the span of twenty-five seconds, Shawn and Gus’ dynamic can be defined by the quick wit of a joke carousel, a slap-based argument, and then a harmonized “Suck it!”
We should all be so lucky as to have a lifelong friendship in the way that Shawn and Gus do. The best microcosm of their dynamic comes in “Lassie Jerky” when Gus is worried about the tracking device he swallowed. “What if my body rejects the alloys in the composite?” he says, crippled by worry and acutely aware of the scientific implications of swallowing metal. To this, Shawn replies tritely with a shrug, “You’ll poop it out; it’s fine.” (Gus later does just this in a hilarious sequence that begins with Lassie, caught in a bear trap, falling into a river, continues to Gus sprinting away from the found footage cameraman with a vague, “Don’t worry, Shawn! You do you!,” and ending with Lassie catching the camera, which had been snatched by a bird, with one hand. It’s an astounding scene.)
Much of the humor on Psych flowed through Shawn and Gus, but it also came from a number of perfectly delivered lines (A drugged Lassie squeals, “Hey, you found my shoe!” A frantic Shawn exclaims while under threat of death, “Lassie! Jules knows how to shoot a crossbow!”) and quick-talking subversion that requires a second thought to actually parse what Shawn had just said (“His wife was stolen from him by that beautiful bastard face dancer Derek Hough. His words. Though, I, too, would’ve chosen the word, Derek.”) It also came about through a number of delightful recurring gags, like Shawn claiming he’s heard things “both ways,” Gus grinning through a “Come on, son, a series of false aliases (“I’m Shawn Spencer and this is my partner, Hummingbird Saltalamacchia”), and requests to not be something (“Gus, don’t be the ribs that flip over Fred Flintstone’s car”). By maintaining these constants throughout the run of Psych, it helped cultivate the cult feel of the show, as if we were all privy to something special with humor hand-crafted just for us.
For as much as Gus would waffle between inhibiting and indulging Shawn, there were plenty of characters who took a firm stance on how to interact with him. Lassie was of the mold who directly opposed Shawn’s style of crime-solving, but a number of fun recurring characters found it sweet to play along with Shawn. There was Pierre Despereaux (Cary Elwes), who embodied the classic criminal archetype of the international art thief. He also had an encyclopedic knowledge of films (from Miller’s Crossing to Rocky to Harry Potter) and spent a great many of his episodes having fun with Shawn’s talents. There was Mary Lightly (Jimmi Simpson), who died in Shawn’s arms, and Father Peter Westley (Ray Wise), who saved Shawn’s life. And of course, there were Woody (Kurt Fuller) and Buzz (Sage Brocklebank) who allowed Shawn’s antics to slip into standard crime work because they knew it was always more fun to jive with Shawn’s sensibility than to stand in the way of it.
It’s this sensibility that has to be one of the most uniquely engaging in all of television and it’s why Shawn Spencer will always be a favorite character of mine throughout all of television. Shawn does noble work even though many would tend to think that what he does is less important than the true glue of our society. It reminds me of when comedians like Michael Schur and B.J. Novak go to Harvard and use their immense intelligence to become comedians instead of what is stereotypically associated with Harvard. I love when people use their talents to be silly and funny, just like how Shawn could have been as dreary as CBS’ Simon Baker, but instead, he took his investigative abilities and had so much fun with them. Whether that was how easily distracted he was to the point where it looked like he had no fear of a bullet (thanks to diversions like baked Alaska and the potential of fatherhood) or how frequently he would just make shit up for the sake of lying, Shawn knew how to expertly balance fun with clue reading.
He was also quite deft at playing dumb, so as to make his grand crime-solving abilities even more impressive to those who played witness to them. To Shawn, letters and numbers are Hieroglyphics and the “study of theory” is just redundant. He can’t pronounce any word in French and he sings “Eternal Flame” when he’s supposed to be silent — because who can resist a solid sing-along? This kind of behavior made it very easy for him to strike the nerves of others, but it also proved to be solid defense mechanisms for Shawn’s own insecurity. (Would they have gotten him killed in real life? Who’s to say?) It takes a lot to wound Shawn because, for the most part, he lets slights (even from his own parents) roll off his taut limbs. A keen awareness of these antics and their purpose from the “thick-tufted boy genius who ice skates through life on polished blades of snarky eloquence” is required to understand that much of what Shawn does comedically is just as a mask for insecurities about his own lack of emotionality at times when he needs to be open and honest.
Psych didn’t dabble between these two tones often, but when Steve Franks steered into it, he did it with brilliance. Granted, Psych did have the benefit of being an hour-long comedy, allowing plenty of time for dramatic dalliances, but it also came with Shawn understanding when to take things seriously. If there weren’t high stakes or immediate danger, Shawn would harness a lacksadaiscal approach to interacting with Lassie and the rest of the SBPD. But in “Mr Yin Presents…,” as soon as Jules vanishes from contact, Shawn communicates with the other detectives immediately, deferring to them throughout. He blames himself for her disappearance, but he also knows it’s not time to be goofy if she’s to return safely.
In addition to the occasional thrilling twists, Psych was filled with plenty of genre homage episodes that went beyond simple parody. “Dual Spires” is an obvious Twin Peaks parable, but it also contains archetypes from John Hughes movies and American Idol (characters are named Paula and Randy Jackson). “Lassie Jerky” was filmed in the aforementioned style popularized by The Blair Witch Project, coupled with a Bigfoot search documentary (complete with the go-to found footage excuse for perpetual filming: that “people need to know!”). “100 Clues” is the Clue/Psych blend we always deserved, anchored by a Madeline Kahn tribute, appearances from the original cast, a psychic flair to Tim Curry’s famous final monologue, flames, a singing telegram, and an ambiguous butler named Clithsssssby (Garrett Morris).
But “Mr. Yin Presents…” is easily Psych’s most holistic homage. There are elements of Zodiac to it. After all, Simpson appears in the film and in the episode, as Mary is a character who is obsessed with determining the true identity behind Yin and Yang (which is representative of the Chinese Zodiac). In this episode, the killer is connected to Shawn’s past and aims to hit him as personally as possible, which is unlike the random killers of the Zodiac Killer. Instead, Mr. Yin leans more into heavy tributes to Alfred Hitchcock.
The episode begins with a viewing of Psycho and climaxes with a massive Hitchcock cross-over. Some of the Easter eggs are obvious (Lassie running from an airplane like Cary Grant in North by Northwest, Shawn viewing his friends from a wheelchair in a high-rise window like Jimmy Stewart in Rear Window). Others are more subtle (a life ring symbolizes Lifeboat, steps are counted to mirror The 39 Steps, a glass of milk is given to Gus like it came straight from Suspicion). Ultimately, with dolly zooms and stationary cars alike, “Mr. Yin Presents…” might go down as the best episode Psych ever pulled off. It’s silly and serious in equal measure while also orchestrating the greatest Hitchcock celebration this side of TCM. It brings out the best of Psych: characters working together in spite of their conflicts, pop culture as a path forward in the investigative process, and a genuine understanding of Shawn’s motivation to solve crimes.
What does call Shawn to action? The glory of being right? The fame of being the county’s greatest psychic? Perhaps these are ancillary bonuses for Shawn, but he’s driven by the same thing most television detectives are: the knowledge that what he’s doing is the right thing, the just thing. The Village receives a mention multiple times during Psych from characters who feel that they’ve lost faith in the goodness of humanity. Both Big Ed and the founders of Dual Spires isolated themselves from the growing darkness of society, but Shawn would never follow in their massive (literally) footsteps because his path to a greater world is to fight the evil within it. The way he fights is to solve the crimes as quickly as possible, but to also do it with humor. A more just world needs more laughter, of course.
Occasionally, Shawn can be blinded by his belief that his way is not only the best way, but the only way. It manifests in the sense where he can actively disrupt Lassie’s and Jules’ work, but also in that he can be incredibly dismissive of Gus’ wishes. And I don’t just mean because he ignores Gus’ request to not listen to the Weird Science theme in the car or to not use his one prison phone call to vote for Idol. I mean in the way Shawn confesses in the series finale, “The Break-Up.” Before Shawn dips out of Santa Barbara, he gives DVDs to all the people he worked with over the past eight years. (Lassie’s DVD scene is my favorite because just when Shawn is about to admit to his psychic truth, Lassie ejects the DVD and breaks it in half. God, I just want to cry thinking about it.) To Gus, he waxes,
“I accept that this is my fatal flaw. I just can’t quite engage all the way when I really need to. When it really matters, you know? When the chips are down. So I guess what I’m saying is that I’m sorry, Gus. I’m sorry that I can’t do goodbyes. I tried so hard to tell you, man. I just suck at the real stuff, you know that. You’re gonna be fine. You’re gonna be better than fine. I just can’t help thinking that the only problem that you really had this whole time is me. And I’ve kept you from the life you deserve, you know? The life that you’ve earned, the life that you’d have if I hadn’t barged into your office eight years ago and said, ‘We’re gonna play detective, whether you want to or not.’ I love you, man.”
It’s a necessary admission from Shawn. He could be insensitive to Gus’ wishes, but he was never holding Gus back. Gus knows as much as he tears up and shakes his head in response to Shawn putting himself down. But this acceptance for one another, taking themselves as exactly as they are, is a necessary final step in their relationship for the audience to feel better about them running off to San Francisco, keeping up their same antics, and taking baby steps into adulthood. Shawn and Gus are eternal and even when we thought it would be goodbye, they kept returning — to us and to each other.
If Psych debuted today, the world would probably be too pessimistic to accept it. In the world of the show, they’d be too cynical (like Lassie) to believe that Shawn was anything but a bullshit artist who knew how to put his fingers to his cranium. In our world, viewers would be too cynical to believe that the characters would believe Shawn. But in Santa Barbara? On the USA Network? In the world of teeth sucking, pineapples, and The Breakfast Club guest spots? In that world, characters are always welcome.
