2014 TV preview: ‘Intelligence,’ ‘True Detective’ among top 5 new January shows to watch

With a new year comes a new start, new resolutions, and … new shows. There’s a great deal of new programming coming out this month that could be smart, entertaining, funny, and above all different than everything else on TV. The other great thing about it? There are a few shows that you may have seen advertised at some point, but the others may serve as nice little surprises to your TV library.

With this in mind, we are here to provide the service of helping to point out some of the shows that you should at least be putting on your DVR in the next 30 days. These are not the only new series that are starting up, but whether it be for the purpose of star power or just the premise alone, these are worth watching out for.

“Intelligence” (premiering on Tuesday, January 7 at 9:00 p.m. Eastern) – A secret government division and a guy with special powers courtesy of a chip in his brain sounds a ton like “Chuck,” but there are still a few things that this CBS show has going for it in the casting department. It’s the first series role for Josh Holloway since “Lost,” and he is joined here by “CSI” titan Marg Helgenberger and also Meghan Ory, who is coming over after two years on “Once Upon a Time.”

“Killer Women” (premiering on Tuesday, January 7) – It’s almost like combining a little bit of “Justified” and a little bit of a Robert Rodriguez movie. This shouldn’t be much of a surprise in that Sofia Vergara has worked with the “Machete” director, and serves as an executive producer behind this stylistic series on ABC about a Texas Ranger (Tricia Helfer, “Battlestar Galactica”) who isn’t anything like Chuck Norris.

“True Detective” (premiering on Sunday, January 12 at 9:00 p.m.) – One of HBO’s more ambitious shows is this gritty, mysterious cop drama that boasts two of the best leads that we have seen on any show in some time: Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson. This is not necessarily a story that we will say much about other than you should watch it. It spans many years, and shows you just what a case can do to two people desperate for the truth.

“Looking” (premiering on Sunday, January 19 at 10:30) – HBO is swinging for the fences here in giving “Girls” a good counterpart on its Sunday-night lineup. “Looking” is a series starring Jonathan Groff (“Glee”) as a young gay man trying to find his footing in San Francisco, and the show has some similar themes to “Girls” in that there is humor, but the point is more about digesting the experience.

“Black Sails” (premiering on Saturday, January 25 at 9:00) – Even more ambitious than “True Detective” in a way, “Black Sails” is Starz making a large financial commitment to a pirate show shot in South Africa, and one that is designed to give you a gritty look at how they lived, while also combining a little bit of history and fiction to tell its story. Even if you’re not a pirate fanatic, this may still be something worth checking out.

Photo: HBO