Elsbeth Season 4 Review: Carrie Preston’s Delightfully Offbeat Sleuth Remains One of Television’s Greatest Pleasures

At the heart of Elsbeth Season 4, the wildly entertaining procedural from the makers of The Good Wife, is Carrie Preston’s deceptively shrewd performance, bringing to life one of network television’s most endearing characters. Part Columbo, part Lucille Ball, the kooky sleuth disarms suspects with her sunny disposition and scatterbrained charm, concealing a razor-sharp mind.

When Elsbeth came on the air, the show gave the classic CBS crime procedural a deliciously old-fashioned twist. It revives the Peter Falk-signature inverted mystery format, where we know who the killer is in the opening scene, even before the investigation begins. The suspense doesn’t lie in the whodunit, but in how the main eccentric character catches the culprit.

What is Elsbeth Season 4 about?

However, the joy of watching Elsbeth is how she catches the culprit, turning each case into a clever game of cat and mouse unlike anything seen on television, network or streaming.

The story follows Elsbeth Tascioni (Emmy-winning Carrie Preston), who has been through a lot since leaving the Windy City for the Big Apple. When she first arrived in New York, at Carey Agos’s behest and recommendation, she secretly investigated Captain C.W. Wagner (The Wire’s Wendell Pierce) while assisting the police in their incompetent investigations.

After the cat’s out of the bag, Wagner and Tascioni patch things up. Meanwhile, Preston’s real-life husband, Michael Emerson (Lost), delivers a deliciously sinister turn as a corrupt judge whose chilling arrogance and calculating menace ultimately land Elsbeth behind bars. After Wagner secures her release, she sees her best friend Kaya (Carra Patterson) leave for a promotion.

Elsbeth Season 4 Review

Between solving cases, the upcoming season delves into Elsbeth’s personal life. She becomes more involved in her son Teddy’s (Ben Levi Ross) life as he and his fiancé, Roy (Hayward Leach), plan their wedding. (Hopefully, this means a guest spot by her ex-husband, played by Will Patton of Yellowstone.) Then, there is the issue of her romance with Alec Bloom (Ivan Hernandez).

Elsbeth is from Robert and Michelle King, who have now created a handful of intellectually sharp shows for America’s oldest network. Besides The Good Wife, they created Evil, BrainDead, The Good Fight, and the new series Cupertino. At the heart of the show, beyond the goofy goodness, is a character who doesn’t reinvent herself, but those around her do, as they find their place.

Preston is terrific as the titular character, in a role she was born to play. The actress plays the character’s well-drawn eccentricities like a guitar, tuning them every week. However, those comedic moments, so offbeat, oddball, but full of heart, go far beyond the normal comic relief. That is why the character was created over a decade ago to begin with.

Is Elsbeth Season 4 worth watching

In her original run as a supporting character, Preston’s Elsbeth is much like Ted Lasso, displaying almost toxic positivity. As the series has progressed, we see her positivity as a more conscious choice, not a quirk, which makes the character richer and less cartoonish. The character has become a defining symbol of resilience, while never taking away from all that procedural goodness.

Elsbeth is practically a cultural touchstone, as it is one of the few shows that features one of the first neurodiverse female characters to helm a show on network television. Yes, the character has never been officially labeled. Still, my training tells me her hyperfocus, rapid associative thinking, distractibility, and impulsivity aren’t stereotypes, but behaviors Preston plays beautifully, delivering clever mysteries, offbeat humor, and irresistible charm in one of television’s most distinctive pleasures.

The new season of the CBS series Elsbeth premieres October 8th! We screened the first two episodes for this review.

Elsbeth Season 4 Review: Carrie Preston’s Delightfully Offbeat Sleuth Remains One of Television’s Greatest Pleasures