TV Reviews : Psychic Pursuer Pitted Against a Psychic Killer

Fear usually isn’t much fun. But in “Fear,” premiering Sunday night at 9 on Showtime, we have a rather intriguing psycho chiller. It’s pretty much chilly from the opening shot.

It’s a variation of the pursuit-of-the-serial-killer-who-then-pursues-the-pursuer plot. But it’s twisty and turny because the pursuer, Cayce Bridges (played by Ally Sheedy), is a gifted psychic, and the pursued, nicknamed the Shadow Man (Pruitt Taylor Vince), is likewise a psychic--only a better one.

His special charm is that he enjoys, absolutely delights in, extracting fear from his victims before completing his slashings.

Cayce has helped police solve serial murders most foul and has written books about the cases. But she has always kept a proper distance from the action--until now. Now Shadow Man knows whatever she’s thinking whenever she thinks it, which makes detecting a tricky business.

Now we know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, “Hey, man, get real, get a life, go shopping. . . . Ally Sheedy as a psychic chasing a mad killer?”

Except for occasional slippage back to Valleyspeak, with tense writing and direction by Rockne O’Bannon, Sheedy does a credible job of holding it all together. Nobody said fear was gonna be easy.