Variety Review: ‘Deception’

Variety

Depending on one’s political persuasion, 2018 either definitively is, or is not, a year in which there’s diversion to be mined from a narcissistic showman who can’t stop talking about how great he is on TV while making the FBI look outrageously dumb. Such is the conceit of the midseason replacement “Deception,” which is about a magician (played by Jack Cutmore-Scott) who helps the FBI solve crimes. Never rising above its hokey premise, the procedural is further sunk by transparent mysteries, hollow supporting characters, and a fatal lack of surprises.