Prime's latest police procedural is perhaps the ultimate example of welding together two previously successful series.

At the most basic level, Instinct (Mondays, from June 18, 8.30pm, Prime) is essentially Castle-meets-Elementary (admittedly with a hint of House, bits of Bones and a soupcon of The Blacklist).

Like both those shows, it boasts a charismatic lead playing an eccentric, crime-solving character who exasperates his more by-the-book partner with his antics.

Alan Cumming plays Instinct's writer, former CIA agent and university psychology professor Dylan Reinhart.

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Despite author being one of the many strings to his bow, former CIA agent and university psychology professor Dylan Reinhart (Alan Cumming) is definitely closer to Jonny Lee Miller's Sherlock Holmes than Nathan Fillion's Richard Castle. Variously described as a walking Wikipedia and Professor Psychopath, he possesses a phonographic memory, a bartending husband and a penchant for game-playing.

When a serial killer begins a murderous spree seemingly inspired by Reinhart's best-seller, he's sought out by the New York Police Department's Elizabeth "Lizzie" Needham (Bojana Novakovic).

Like Elementary, Criminal Intent and Castle before it Instinct boasts a charismatic lead playing an eccentric, crime-solving character who exasperates his more by-the-book partner with his antics.

Pegging her for a detective straight away because of her "don't care how I look pantsuit" and "humdrum flats" (Needham seems unlikely to follow Elementary's Joan Watson – Lucy Liu – as a fashion icon) , Reinhart initially turns her request down flat. However, persuaded by his publisher (a scene-stealing Whoopi Goldberg) that this is just the challenge he needs to put the "pizzazz" back into his writing, Reinhart changes his mind. It's only then though that he discovers Needham's tragic recent backstory.

Based on James Patterson's 2017 novel Murder Games, Instinct very much relies on Cumming's chutzpah to lift it above some very obvious plotting.

Based on the opening episode, it's mysteries won't severely tax viewers and most of its delights will revolve around Reinhart's witty bon mots and cutting observations. His turn as strategist Eli Gold in The Good Wife proved what he could do the meaty role and while Reinhart feels a little more two-dimensional, it is great to see the Scottish actor get his well overdue turn in the spotlight. Serbian-Australian actress Novakovic (Edge of Darkness) is something of an unknown quantity at this point, but then again so was Castle's Stana Katic before she bloomed into the perfect foil for Fillion's self-confessed "rich asshole".

Instinct also sees a welcome return to Prime Time for one of Lost's unsung heroes Naveen Andrews. He plays the mysterious Julian Cousins, one of Reinhart's former CIA colleagues who can help him tap into the places the NYPD can't.

File under promising, if somewhat predictable.

 - Stuff