Jesse Stone's involuntary retirement ends when the young sheriff who replaced him is blown up in the town police car. The loyal staffers who worked for Jesse have abandoned the department and Jesse must try to solve the case on his own.

Tom Selleck's trademark rumpled charisma continues to pay huge dividends in this eighth adaptation of Robert Parker's mystery series, focusing on the beleaguered small-town police chief Jesse Stone. Picking up where the previous installment Innocents Lost left off, the story begins with the forcibly retired Stone spinning his wheels in the Massachusetts town of Paradise, pursuing a tentative relationship with an aspiring singer (Gloria Reuben) while trying to resist his old self-destructive tendencies. When his replacement on the force meets an explosive end, however, Stone finds himself back in the game. Selleck, who wrote the script with Michael Brandman, wears this role like a just-right shoe, portraying his character's stubbornness and reluctant heroism in a fashion that does full justice to the late Parker's literary blueprint. His charm, combined with the presence of old pros such as Saul Rubinek, Kathy Baker, and Stephen McHattie, make for an enjoyable reminder of the pleasures of a long-running detective series, where the resolution of the mystery isn't half as important as the interactions between the people tasked to solve it. On the debit side, the familiarity between the characters can sometimes feel a little too comfortable, with a meandering middle act that occasionally succumbs to a case of the cutes. (Even the biggest dog lovers in the world may find their patience tried by the number of reaction shots given to Jesse's trusty pooch.) Fortunately, the whodunit aspect finishes strong, with series director Robert Harmon (who also helmed the splattery '80s horror classic The Hitcher) wringing a surprising amount of tension out of the cat-and-mouse climax set on an abandoned ship. By the time Benefit of the Doubt comes to a close, it's difficult not to wish for further obstacles to be placed in Stone's path, as soon as possible. There's nothing wrong with a formula, provided it's a good one. --Andrew Wright