Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Professionals’ On The CW, Where Brendan Fraser And Tom Welling Team In A Globetrotting Action-Thriller

When we saw who was in the latest CW international import, Professionals, we had to double check that it was actually an international show. But, yes, despite the presence of Brendan Fraser and Tom Welling, the show was actually made for a Swedish SVOD service in 2020, and the CW bought the American rights earlier this year. Does having two fan-favorite stars make the show worth watching?

PROFESSIONALS: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: French Guiana. A massive modern building with a “SWANN CORP” sign.

The Gist: In a pre-launch celebration, billionaire Peter Swann (Brendan Fraser) talks about Panacea, the new and revolutionary satellite his company developed that’s supposed to detect potential pandemics with the hope that it can stop their spread. During the celebration he highlights Dr. Graciela Davila (Elena Anaya), the project’s main scientist who also just happens to be his girlfriend. Also there is his philandering father Reggie (Andre Jacobs) and mostly disinterested daughter Jane (Jazzara Jaslyn).

At the same time in London, two Europol agents with evidence against an international crime lord get intercepted by what looks like a police officer. It turns out to be Vincent Corbo (Tom Welling), a hired gun who used to be in counterintelligence. He did the job to wipe out his younger brother’s death, but when the kingpin offers both of them a job, Vincent refuses.

When the rocket with Panacea on it blows up shortly after launch, Peter and Grace seek out Vincent to find out what happened; Grace and Vincent were a couple in the past, but their relationship didn’t survive his counterintelligence career. Back in French Guiana, Vincent makes sure the corrupt police chief knows he’s looking for whoever sabotaged that rocket by sending the chief on a “snipe hunt” for the source of a rifle bullet whose casing he found a mile or so away from the launch pad.

Their chase sends them into the local town, where Peter buys the only hotel in order to get access to its security videos, and Vincent tries to figure out where the person who did actually shoot down the rocket is and who hired him.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Professionals has the vibe of action shows like 24 and Homeland, though this show doesn’t feel nearly as dynamic as those other two. It’s also somewhat of a remake of the 2012 film Soldiers Of Fortune.

Our Take: Despite the presence of Fraser and Welling, Professionals is an international production, having debuted in a Scandinavian streaming service in 2020. Despite some exotic-looking shooting locations, it gives off the vibe of a show without a lot of budget, or at least one that didn’t have a lot left after bringing its two stars on board.

Welling and Fraser are both fine; they do the most with the confusing storyline and dopey dialogue they’re given. But showrunners Mike Colleary and Jeff Most, both veterans of action films like Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and The Specialist, saddle them with a kitchen-sink plot that makes very little movement in the first episode and a supporting cast that isn’t up to the task of making their characters into anything but one-dimensional action-film tropes.

The first episode spends a lot of time giving both Vincent and Peter backstories; Peter’s mostly involves family, and Vincent’s mostly involves his past career. Also Vincent has to dodge that Europol agent, Kurt Neumann (Ken Duken), as he comes looking for that evidence that Vincent stole from him. There’s also Eva (Larissa Andrade), a woman back in England who seems to have a huge influence on Vincent’s life. Grace is there to connect the two men as well as try to stave off a pandemic that she hoped the satellite would have been able to do help with.

None of that is super-clear during the first episode, though, because it takes so many asides that it makes the central mystery murky. Also, all of the characters outside of the ones played by Welling and Fraser have accents that are a bit mysterious, which barely covers up the fact that most of them look less like they’re acting and more like they’re reciting dialogue.

Sex and Skin: None in the first episode.

Parting Shot: After Vincent goes back to where the gunman’s car flipped a bunch of times to find out who hired him, he comes back to the helicopter that his team brought to pick everyone up. Peter bellows at him to get on, and they fly out of the scene.

Sleeper Star: Really, there isn’t a standout here because Welling and Fraser feel like they’re acting on a much different level than anyone else.

Most Pilot-y Line: Peter’s annoyingly disdainful daughter tells him that he should build a cell tower instead of rockets. “I would do that. I could do that. I will do that,” Peter replies. Even Fraser can save a line that inane and deperate-sounding.

Our Call: SKIP IT. Sure, it’s great to see Brendan Fraser and Tom Welling on our screens, running around defeating bad guys together. But Professionals is such a slapdash show that it doesn’t really tap into the potential of two fan-favorite stars playing off each other.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.