Riddled with Deceit: A Martha's Vineyard Mystery

This series isn't the best Hallmark has to offer, but it's okay.

This one is the second in the series.

This story concerns a family emerald broach worth a fortune. Jeff (Jesse Metcalfe) keeps being dragged out of law enforcement retirement, this time to help protect the broach and its wearer Britt (Sunita Prasad) who has presented it and is wearing it to a special event.

Though she wants to take it with her, Jeff convinces her to lock it in the high tech safe for the night. However, when she arrives home, she is attacked and is only saved by Jeff and Zee (Sarah Lind). And the emerald broach is gone from the safe.

Murder follows.

I've never been overwhelmed by Jesse Metcalfe even in his Desperate Housewives days. It was hard for me to warm up to the story or the characters.

Entertaining enough and keeps your interest. The cast has great chemistry and the locations are beautiful. Only an 8 because of continuity, the leads are wearing the same clothes although supposedly a day or two has passed. Overall a good watch. I'm a mystery buff so I'm addicted to Hallmark Mysteries.

I like that the characters' personal stories continue through the series and connect them, although the plots are different, so it's not necessary to see them in order if you don't want to. It was suspenseful and mostly unpredictable.

I feel pretty much like I did after the first movie in this series.

Police procedures seem pretty lax especially with Jeff running around entering private property, questioning and chasing suspects and other things police are authorized to do. But he's not officially on the force and he doesn't announce that he is authorized by the police. And he takes Zee with him half the time, but at least she's the coroner.

The whodunit keeps the viewers on their toes. Like the first movie, the pool of suspects gets fairly large and there are some good red herrings. I thought I knew who the bad guy was until he was the first one dead. There were some interesting twists toward the end, especially about the broach.

Jeff and Zee are into flirt mode, but I'm still not impressed with the chemistry. Each one almost comes straight out and says to the other with little preamble "tell me your most personal secrets". That's one of the problems when there is a lot going on in a two hour TV movie - there's not a lot of time for being subtle in the relationships.

Zee's friend Britt Prajna has recovered The Lakshmi Emeralds, a $5 million brooch, which her family lost long ago. A masked man breaks into Britt's home to steal the jewels and sends her to the hospital. Jeff and Zee go on the search for the thief.

I am more convinced than ever that Jesse Metcalfe and Sarah Lind don't have the required chemistry. The franchise should have switched her and Chelsea Hobbs. Somebody screwed up the casting process. It would be daring for Jeff to get into a love triangle. That may be the best way to generate more romance energy and quite frankly, it would be a good departure for this type of show to have more complicated romance. As for the mystery, it's fine for this type of TV movies. This franchise is more likely to rise and fall due to the romance rather than the mysteries.