Cheryl West is a middle-aged woman with four children: twin brothers Logan and Cal, and daughters Heather, an aspiring model and Hope, the youngest and an aspiring filmmaker. After Cheryl's career criminal husband Wolf is sentenced to five years in prison, Cheryl forces her family to quit its criminal activities. However, even from jail, Wolf interferes with her attempts to reform their family.
The series is based on the New Zealand TV series Outrageous Fortune, which was created by James Griffin and Rachel Lang. Lyn Greene and Richard Levine wrote the pilot of Scoundrels for American television, and they serve as the series show runners. ABCgreen-lit the series in January 2010 with an eight episode order. Madsen was cast in early February, followed by Flueger. Rambin came on board in late February, along with Neal McDonough, who was originally cast as Wolf West. Filming began March 16, 2010 in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Three days into the shoot, McDonough was replaced by David James Elliot due to McDonough's strict religious beliefs and refusal to film sex scenes. This was ABC's second attempt at reformatting Outrageous Fortune for an American audience. In 2008, a pilot named Good Behavior wasn't picked up by the network.
Reception
The series pilot "And Jill Came Tumbling After" received mixed reviews with The Boston Herald claiming the show was "wicked fun" and praised the show's cast. A reviewer from The Boston Globe was quoted to say "Not a single one of the characters were funny enough, or touching enough, to make me want to see more of them. If the Wests were thrown in jail, I’d be tempted to throw away the key." On the review collaboration site Metacritic, Scoundrels currently holds 56% based on 18 critic reviews. The show's second episode Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary got overall a better response than the pilot with it earning positive reviews. TV Fanatic gave the episode 3/5 saying "the episode was an improvement on the pilot, with the characters developing and the show overall finding its tone and footing a bit." and "there were decent dramatic moments and good laughs in “Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary."
Cancellation
On October 24, 2010 it was revealed on ABC's Twitter page that Scoundrels would not be returning for another season.
