Published: Tuesday, 19th January, 2010 4:06pm

Got Leverage?

by Geek Chic

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Christmas is over. We're well into January. What this actually means, finally, is some decent telly. But forget the return of 24 and Lost, the most unmissable US show of the next few weeks is Leverage.

Following a team of thieves, hackers and grifters who seek revenge against those who use power and wealth to victimize people, Leverage starts on Bravo this week.

Oscar-winner Tim Hutton takes the lead, as former insurance investigator Nate whose son died as a result of corporate greed. He now puts his energy, quick mind and keen intellect toward securing justice for society's underdogs, having teamed up with a bunch of criminals who - it turns out - have their own code of ethics, including a martial arts expert (Angel's Christian Kane) and a grifter played by Hustle's Gina Bellman. In a lot of ways it owes a lot to Hustle, mixed with a smattering of The A Team and a pop culture reference-laden script zinging with one liners and great chemistry between the ensemble cast.

Laugh-out-loud funny in places and with conspiracies fun enough to unravel this is unashamedly fluff, but well-written, well-made fun fluff and arguably one of the best things you'll see on telly this January (you're watching Being Human already, right?).

Plus, the writers of Leverage are unashamed geeks, and manage to shoehorn in random little nods which don't relate to the script necessarily but make for amusement nonetheless - watch out for an early episode where resident hacker Hardison books the rest of the team on a flight using aliases including Peter Davison, Sylvester McCoy and Tom Baker.

If you want to brighten the grey days of early January, Geek Chic can recommend nothing better...

* Leverage series one starts on January 20 on Bravo