Salamander (ABC 2018, Larenz Tate, Allison Miller)

In Salamander we open on a heist: the robbery of sixty-six specific safety deposit boxes housed in an exclusive private bank. The robbers break open the boxes, but the boxes don’t contain money or valuables, just personal effects: thumb drives, photos and documents. The following morning, when the bank manager, Kant, discovers the robbery, surprisingly he doesn’t call the police – leaving us to wonder: just who do those sixty six boxes belong to?!

Meanwhile, Ethan Anders is on a blind date with Nora Schaller. It is not going well. They come from totally different worlds, and it’s awkward. Nora is a psychiatrist for Homeland Security with an expensive education and an uptown brownstone. Ethan is Queens through and through, and the gains he’s made in life are because he worked his ass off to get them. The two realize that they are far from an ideal match and end the date, thinking it is goodbye forever. Ethan works at a boutique security firm as a design engineer alongside his ebullient and impulsive brother, Kevin. The firm provides security for the bank from our opening, and Ethan notices that someone at the firm shut off the bank’s security system the night before – an “inside man” to the robbery.

Worse, Ethan suspects the culprit was his brother. Troubled, he seeks counsel from his best friend and AA sponsor: David Vargas, a former police detective. Vargas tells Eddie that he’s got no choice but to confront Kevin with what he knows… But when Ethan returns to the office, he discovers a total blood bath. Everyone at the firm, including his beloved brother, has been shot dead. Ethan is taken for questioning by two police detectives. But, on the way there, one of the detectives kills his partner and tries to kill Ethan… who barely escapes. Ethan is terrified – whoever robbed the bank not only killed his brother to cover it up, but was willing to kill everyone else in the office in the process – and whoever they are, they have reach into the NYPD.

Ethan doesn’t know where to turn. He’s too afraid to return home, or to any of his friends. So, he goes to the only place he can think of — he arrives on Nora’s doorstep, begging for help. Upon hearing his story, Nora fears that Ethan might be paranoid or insane – but he pleads for her to trust him, and, reluctantly, Nora decides to help him out. Using his brilliant cyber skills and her government credentials, they start to dig into this mystery and discover that the safety deposit boxes share a common code word – Salamander — and that the boxes are each linked to politicians, industry heads, and financiers. But, why? And what is their significance?

As they are reeling from this, they discover that Helen Barrett, a U.S Senator, has just been arrested for blowing up a ferry in the east river. Ethan and Nora are stunned: Helen Barrett’s name is on the Salamander list. Just what is going on here? Is someone using the contents of the boxes to blackmail their owners into doing horrible deeds. But who? And why? Ethan and Nora realize that, despite the fact that they barely know each other, and have almost nothing in common, they may be the only ones capable of solving this mystery and discovering who is responsible for the murder of Ethan’s brother and is now trying to kill him to keep their enterprise a secret.

Based on a Swedish original.

cast
Larenz Tate as Ethan Anders
Neil Sandilands as Jack Wang
Allison Miller as Nora Schaller
Elaine Tan as Meghan Connolly
John Leguizamo as David Vargas

key behind the scenes crew
Jeff Pinkner as Executive Producers
Andre Nemec as Executive Producers
Peter Traugott as Executive Producers
Rachel Kaplan as Executive Producers

show type
Crime drama

broadcast from
Currently in development

network and production companies
ABC – ABC Studios