Gather around, all you Michael Weatherly fans. He just made his final appearance on NCIS last night, but he’s already got his next gig lined up, and you can see the preview for his new show below. Take a look!
Michael Weatherly’s new show, Bull, just had this preview released by CBS to prepare audiences for the show, which was announced as part of the network’s fall schedule today. In the drama, Weatherly plays Dr. Jason Bull, the founder of a very successful trial consulting firm. Bull is actually based on the early work of, wait for it, Dr. Phil McGraw, who ran his own trial consulting firm before becoming a talk show host. Actually, leading his firm is what, eventually, led to his popular talk show. He worked with Oprah when she ran afoul of Texas cattle ranchers during the mad-cow disease scare of 1996 and was sued by them. His consulting firm likely helped the trial turn in her favor. And, she liked his no-nonsense, plain-talking advice so much that she helped him get his own show where he could dispense that advice to the masses.
Aside from the shock of realizing that Michael Weatherly is basically playing Dr. Phil, Bull looks like it could be a fun show filled with appropriately slick talk and lots of brainy tactics that will help even the most slimy-looking defendants gain ground with juries during trial. While the character certainly allows Weatherly to play someone different from NCIS’ Tony DiNozzo, we can still see a lot of what made him shine in that role for 13 seasons. While Jason Bull is clearly a bit more serious-minded, he’s still got the humor and eye twinkle that made the actor shine as DiNozzo.
The preview of Bull does a good job of setting up the character and the world he works in. The client he’s presented with looks to be a standard spoiled rich kid who could be so entitled that he’d kill someone, accidentally or on purpose, and still walk around with a smarmy grin on his face, mostly because he’s walking around with a smarmy grin on his face while being accused of murder. Through a rigorous process of cataloging the likes and dislikes of the jurors, he begins to pinpoint which ones they can get on their side, and how best to reach them. He proceeds in giving the client, and his defense team, a makeover designed to get the jury to see the possibly guilty party differently. All along the way, Dr. Bull is cool, confident in his abilities and completely collected; and this is exactly what you’d want from someone who’s helping your lawyers figure out how to keep you out of prison.
Bull will debut sometime this fall, in the meantime, you can keep your TV viewing schedule full by checking out our summer premiere schedule.
