Deadly Affairs: TV's New Type Of Soap Opera?

Over the past few seasons the U.S. networks have been dumping most of their long running soap operas.
The shows remained popular but are simply too expensive to produce on a daily business.
But what's a soap opera fan to turn to?
I have a hunch the new series Deadly Affairs might just be the answer.
It contains all the usual soap elements from lust to murder but packages them in the Reality format --meaning the players we see on the scene don't actually say anything --the narration is left to the host. That means the participants aren't paid expensive actor's salaries but it can make for some dramatic clumsiness.
It means that an hour can be packaged fairly inexpensively while satisfying all the requirements of a soap fan.
And Deadly Affairs sports soap diva Susan Lucci as the hostess. The stories are speeded up and not told over many meandering months and who knows. The format of Deadly Affairs just might be satisfying enough.
Lucci is caught all dolled up purring at poolside as he explains the romances she's introducing --the common thread is that they all end in murder.
The actual police investigators are interviewed as are the real neighbors and acquaintances of the subjects,
First up there's the saga of funeral director Michael and his pert wife Jan. Michael inherited a funeral parlor and as he's quoted business is recession proof. Then he meets lusty Angie, a suburban temptress, and pretty soon Jan is found drowned in the family pool.
How the police untangle the web and pin the blame on him is told with lots of pert comments from Lucci.
Then we look at high school sweet hearts Melinda and David who married when just 20. Deeply devoted Christians all seemed well until Melinda began wandering off with college student Mark.
This murder took almost 20 years to solve and how it was done complete with recanting from Melinda forms the basis of the story.
One critic calls the phenomenon "Days Of Our Knives" which is cute.
And it's entirely appropriate that Erica Kane --alias Lucci-- gets the job of hostess.
In the U.S. Deadly Affairs has already debuted strongly making it the second highest series debut in the history of Investigation Discovery.
DEADLY AFFAIRS DEBUTS ON INVESTIGATION DISCOVERY  THURS. OCT. 11 AT 9 P.M.
MY RATING: ***.