‘S.W.A.T.’ reboot follows ‘modern’ vision
O Na Santa Clarita soundstage,ateam leader thanks his crew for its hard work during a scene for the new iteration of “S.W.A.T.,” debuting Thursday on CBS. Like the speech, the part of the set known as “the eagle’s nest” — a sleek concrete and steel space with a boxing ring and flat-screen festooned commandcenter—is somewhat standard issue.
The team leader, however, is not.
Daniel “H ondo” Harrelson,playedby
Shemar Moore (“Criminal Minds”), straddles two worlds — a kid from South Los Angeles who now runs the local special weapons and tactics team.
It is not a tableau that “S.W.A.T.” executive producer Aaron Rahsaan Thomas recalls seeing in his Tv-junkie youth. As a kid in Kansas City, Kansas, Thomas consumed everything from Norman Lear comedies to “H ill Street Blues” and he began to notice something.
Or, more precisely, the absence of something.
“There weren’t enough dramas that were taking peopleofcolorseriously,”he says.
Yes, there were iconic characters like H uggy Bear on “Starsky and H utch” or B.A. Baracus on “The A-team,”buttheirmain function was comic relief, justasblackgueststars functionedaseithershortlived saviors or sinners. As a budding writer, Thomas pondered the meaning of representation and wonderedwhyablack character couldn’t be “intelligent, serious and focused.”
So after working on showsasvariedas“soul Food,” “Friday Night Lights” and “The G et Down,” the University of Southern California film school grad decided to write the character he so rarely saw.
Hisscript came to the attention of Sony, which was looking to reboot “S.W.A.T.” along the lines of the 2003 film adaptation of the ’70s TV show.
‘The next wave’
The new series retains the original’s funky theme song but features many modern updates and a racially diverse cast.
Teamed with Shawn Ryan, creator of “The Shield,” Thomas and fellow executive producers Neal Moritz — who directed the 2003 film — and Justin Lin of “The Fast and the Furious” franchise wanted to go further than window dressing. They were pleasantly surprised that CBS — a network repeatedly criticized for its lack of diversity — wanted to do the same.
“Definitely there was a healthy level of skepticism when it came to whether or not they wanted to do anything different creatively,” says Thomas, who previously worked on CBS shows “Numbers” and “CSI: NY.” “To our fortunate surprise, from the very beginning they were really adamant about trying to stay within their brand but do the next wave, the modern version. To lean into some areas that they hadn’t touched on before.”
The pilot revolves around the accidental shooting of an unarmed black teen by a SWAT team leader and the political appointment of H ondo in the aftermath. (H ondo, the story makes clear, is capable: H e’s just not the next in line.) Though packaged with car chases and shootouts (directed in the pilot by
Lin), the ensuing discussion of black and blue lives is sharper than one might expect.
“CBS gets beaten up sometimes, but I’d like to give them some credit here,” Ryan says. “When we were working on the early drafts, the feedback to us was: ‘This feels like something that you think CBS wants rather than what you want.’ They really encouraged us to not be prisoners of a preconceived notion about what a quoteunquote CBS show was.”
‘There is a middle ground’
That support is crucial to Thomas. Even within the limitations of a network police procedural in which SWAT officers are, essentially, heroes, he has created characters and storylines that he hopes will spark debate on topical issues.
H e was inspired by his own childhood. Thomas lived near a boy who was shot by police. A cop also lived nearby, teaching neighborhood kids to ride bikes and throw a spiral.
“If you could catch his ball, then you knew you could catch,” Thomas says. “When that shooting went down, he completely understood why people would be outraged. H e was H ondo. I always remembered the guy on our block who helped to teach us to play catch. I always thought about him, and it kept me from having bitterness towards police in general.”
“If there’s one unifying thing about this show,” says Ryan, “it’s that you don’t just have to have cops on one side, Black Lives Matter people on the other, that there is a middle ground. And maybe it can be found via a guy like H ondo.”
An ambitious goal
“S.W.A.T.” is also a showcase for the diversity of Los Angeles. Venturing beyond the traditional palm trees versus mean streets depictions, the stories will move from Boyle H eights to Filipinotown to Brentwood and beyond.
In that vein, it was important that “S.W.A.T.” employ a writing and directing staff that includes women and people of color. (In fact, two of the first people encountered on the set are executive story editor Angela Allen and director H olly Dale.)
Which in turn reflects the evolution of the show’s subject matter.
“In the actual SWAT headquarters there are class photos,” Thomas says. “Rows of white faces until very recently when things became a little more diverse. There’s a meta message definitely to seeing a person of color promoted to a position of leadership on a show. H opefully the show, in its own way, can be part of a conversation for a new generation.”
It’s an ambitious goal, for a CBS procedural and a newbie creator. But Thomas is confident in his vision, and the idea that characters matter.
“This is not just an idea that I just want to get on the air; I actually believe in the message,” he says.
“For me what it represents, ultimately, is hope of better communicating between individuals and bodies of people, overall. The couple watching this in Nebraska, even if they never met Shemar before … this may be the only time where they meet such a diverse range of people and what are you going to do with that platform now that you have 43 minutes of their time? I genuinely believe that it can help in its own way.”