High Potential (2024 – )

Morgan Gillory (Kaitlin Olson) is a busy, frugal, hardworking mom of three, who’s more than a little down on her luck. She’s also charismatic and quirky in her attitude and dress, which we characterize as a sexy eclecticism, usually with a mini skirt, combined with a faux fur jacket and exuberantly patterned blouse, and topped off with colorful painted nails. Her frugality comes from necessity. When we see her at the grocery store, she’s carefully monitoring what her teenage daughter Ava puts in the cart, and lip gloss is not on the shopping list which depends upon coupons. She takes the bus (with a grocery store shopping cart in tow) because her car has been seized by a collection agency. At the checkout she knows (to the penny) what the total is and not because she has a calculator in hand, but because her brain is the only calculator she requires. You see, Morgan is also high potential, meaning that her IQ is over 160 and she is basically a genius. As we see from the jump, the way Morgan takes in, processes, stores, and mines information is well, not normal. It’s extraordinary! High potential then refers to her capacity to observe and retain more information than the average person.

The first time we see her in action is completely accidental, a situation in which her extraordinary abilities were unsolicited. Back to the down on her luck part, although a veritable genius, Morgan makes ends meet by working as a cleaner in a police station. After she plugs in her headphones and hits play on the dance track, she gyrates her way around the office accidentally knocking over a box of files from an open homicide case. But unlike most risk-averse people, instead of putting the files back and moving right along, Morgan spreads them out and takes a long hard look. Her conclusion? The woman who the department has erroneously labelled a suspect in the death of her husband is actually the second (and missing) victim. But instead of keeping the conclusion to herself (again, not risk-averse), Morgan erases the word “suspect” on the homicide department’s dry-erase board from beneath the woman’s name and writes “victim” before leaving for the night.

Unsurprisingly, the detectives who see her handy work the next morning are flummoxed, angered (it appears mainly inspired by a sense of superiority), and itching to find and punish whoever dared touch their precious dry-erase board. So imagine their shock when the surveillance footage from the squad room cameras reveals that the culprit in the supposedly lowly cleaning lady! The result? Let’s just say it won’t be the first time we see Morgan in lockup in the first episode!

But to her credit, the female Lieutenant Selena Soto (Judy Reyes of Scrubs [2001-2010] and Devious Maids [2013-2016]) is patient, inquisitive, and intelligent enough to ask questions as opposed to assuming the answers. When she releases Morgan, it is to have a conversation not to rebuke her for her interference. She wants to know how Morgan deduced what she did.  That is when Morgan explains the complexity of her beautiful, brilliant mind. Intrigued and under the gun to solve the high-profile murder, Selena tries to enlist the “high potential” Morgan to assist in the case, a decision that is not loved by her detectives including the OCD Adam Karadec (Daniel Sunjata) who sees Morgan as a flighty distraction at best and a catastrophic liability at worst. It’s important to note that Morgan was not at all interested in the consulting position offer which was initially issued as a threat. Calling Selena on her misstep, Morgan informed her that it was better to extend such an offer as a request since, clearly, Selena’s detectives would benefit from Morgan’s insights. But interestingly, even when Selena capitulates, Morgan does not initially say yes, and when she finally does, she has an intriguing demand of her own, one that’s a dealbreaker.

But Adam – initially aloof and dismissive – quickly sees the upside of partnering with Morgan who justifies Selena’s leap of faith by deducing some crucial facts from unlikely sources. For example, Morgan’s neighbour and sometime-babysitter who provides the life span of the fresh cut flowers found at the crime scene which allows Morgan and Adam to conclude that the climate of the green-house-like space was manipulated to throw detectives off from the real time of death. In another riveting moment, when Morgan inadvertently glimpses the doorbell camera footage of the new female suspect she is able to rule her out by proving that the footage was doctored because the supposed date and time of day do not align with the direction of the wind as verified but the position of the eastward facing church and the movement of the palm trees! Come again? We told you Morgan was “high potential”! Needless to say, Selena is sold on her decision to hire Morgan and even the easily annoyed and cynical Adam shows signs that he is developing an appreciation for what Morgan can contribute to the team.

Unlike some cop dramas which place most or all of the emphasis on the characters’ lives on the job, High Potential is also about Morgan as a loving, attentive, and intelligent single mom heading a hectic household which includes her testy teenage daughter Ava (Amirah J), her precocious and bookish grade-school-aged son Elliot (Matthew Lamb), and a small baby, the latter two fathered by Ludo (Taran Killam). If you were wondering, Ava’s father is not in the picture, brining an additional layer of angst to her teen years since she feels excluded by the obvious intellectual kinship between Morgan and Elliot.

But it’s not what you may be thinking. No deadbeat dad plot here! As Morgan assures Ava when prompted, her father was a devoted family man, and she is quite sure that he did not run out on them fifteen years ago. Something happened to him. Remember the bargain Morgan struck with Selena? Well, it had to do with Ava’s father. Selena must help figure out what became of him, or no deal! And as we find out by episode two, Morgan’s gut and heart were on point. The evidence? The contents of her missing partner’s car (retrieved from a store parking lot a few days after his disappearance) reveal that he had purchased diapers. Now why would a man intent on escaping his partner and parental responsibilities buy diapers? Compassionately, Selena delivers the news to Morgan in-person at her home, reassuring her that she is determined to find out what became of her missing partner. It is then that we see Morgan’s armour slip, just a bit, as tears well up in her eyes in synch with Ava’s who has been pretending to sleep on a living room chair while listening to every word exchanged between her mom and the lieutenant.

You see, when Morgan finally accepted Selena’s job offer, it was with the condition to help find her missing partner, but also a raise and paid childcare. Significantly, Morgan’s ex and father of her younger two kids, Ludo, happily takes on the paid childcare duties to which he was already committed.

High Potential is a sharp, fast-paced combination of drama, action, and comedy, the last of which mainly comes from the way that Olson plays Morgan as unpretentious and direct continually unmasking the suppositions, expectations, and arrogance of the detectives and police she assists. For instance, when Lieutenant Melon (Garret Dillahunt) reaches out to Selena for assistance on a string of robberies, it is Morgan who quickly surmises that their suspect is the same person homicide is hunting for a recent murder. How, you ask? She notices the uncharacteristic colour and nature of the gun’s muzzle flash in a video of one of the robberies recalling that only historical firearms with a specific combination of metals in the barrel emit such a glow (which both the surveillance footage from one of the robberies and the homicide captured).

So, you see, it’s not just what Morgan sees (the other detectives from both cases had also seen the videos), but it’s what she makes of what she sees because of all the other information that she witnesses, stores, and crucially, processes! High Potential is sharp as a tack, with intricate but engaging plots, and compelling characters. Furthermore, without feeling preachy, it has timely and uplifting social messages about the strength, determination, and resilience of women and the families we create from biology and love. We’re happy that Morgan and company will be back for season 2  this fall (2025)!