This article contains discussion of addiction.

On one level, “High Potential” is a return to classic TV procedurals, bringing back a case-of-the-week format while also focusing on a season-long mystery — but truthfully, the success of ABC’s hit series rests on the shoulders of one Kaitlin Olson. An incredibly funny and gifted comedic actress who got her start on a low-budget FXX show that’s now one of the longest-running TV shows in modern history (more on that shortly), Olson’s knack for timing and quick, snappy line readings helps her “High Potential” protagonist Morgan Gillory, a former cleaning lady with a photographic memory who ends up becoming a special consultant for the Los Angeles Police Department thanks to her surprise crime-solving skills.

Based on the French-Belgian series “HPI,” which stands for Haut potentiel intellectuel, the American take on “High Potential” utilizes Olson perfectly alongside other TV show veterans like Daniel Sunjata (everything from “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” to “Grey’s Anatomy” to “Rescue Me”) and Judy Reyes (beloved as Carla Espinosa on Scrubs). Like the original, “High Potential” watches Morgan solve a new crime in every episode, typically flanked by Sunjata’s detective and her defacto partner Adam Karadec, while she juggles being a single mother to three kids. So what other TV shows should you check out if you love “High Potential?” Here are some great options.

One of the longest-running live action sitcoms in television history, “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” was originally shot on a shoestring budget and beat the odds to find a longtime home on FXX … and it also launched Kaitlin Olson’s career. Created by Rob “Mac” McElhenney (who now professionally goes by Rob Mac), the show focuses on five Philly dirtbags — Ronald “Mac” McDonald (Mac), “Sweet” Dee Reynolds (Olson), Frank Reynolds (Danny DeVito in one of his many career-defining roles), Dennis Reynolds (Glenn Howerton, a major creative force alongside Mac) and, of course, Charlie Kelly (a diabolically funny Charlie Day, who also runs the show with Howerton and Mac) — who run one of the city’s shoddiest bars, Paddy’s Pub. (There is a real Paddy’s Pub in Philadelphia, though it’s legally unaffiliated with the show.) 

The whole concept of “It’s Always Sunny” is that Mac, siblings Dennis and Dee, their dad Frank, and Charlie never, ever evolve or change, which is precisely what’s helped the show go on for so long. Through bar fights, accidental kidnappings, child beauty pageants, original musicals (“The Nightman Cometh,” a stone-cold classic episode), the “Gang” always sticks together in their misadventures for better and for worse, and the entire series is a showcase of Olson’s masterful comedic instincts. Whether she’s running headfirst into a parked car or bombing (while loudly gagging) at an open mic night, Olson’s Dee will keep you in stitches, and even though Dee is a much more caustic character than Morgan Gillory, it’s important to see where Olson got her start.

You’ve probably heard of “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” considering that it’s one of the most successful spin-offs in television history and has been running for even longer than “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.” To be clear, “Special Victims Unit,” often simply referred to as “SVU,” is quite a bit darker than “High Potential,” because it focuses exclusively on sex crimes … so what do the two shows really have in common?

Well, on a shallow level, Daniel Sunjata appears on both shows; before playing a detective on “High Potential,” he portrayed a crime scene unit technician named Burt Trevor on “SVU” early in the show’s run (and, hilariously, as a bomb squad officer a few years before he booked a recurring role). More to the point, though, you can’t help but love the strong women leading both shows: Morgan Gillory and the legendary Olivia Benson, played by Mariska Hargitay since “SVU” began its run back in 1999. Both Olivia and Morgan have to balance their lives as single moms while also making sure bad guys end up behind bars, and it’s a pleasure to watch both of them pull off this tightrope walk week after week on their respective procedurals.

Just like Morgan Gillory on “High Potential,” Shawn Spencer, the lead character of the USA Network series “Psych” played by James Roday, has an eidetic (or photographic) memory and an uncanny knack for observing things that other people might miss. Unlike Morgan Gillory, though, Shawn tells his colleagues at the Santa Barbara Police Department that he’s actually psychic, which explains why he’s so good at solving their cases for them. Aided by his best friend Burton “Gus” Guster (“The West Wing” standout Dulé Hill), who’s also incredibly intelligent, Shawn solves crimes in California by pretending that he has supernatural abilities that help him find the bad guy every time.

“Psych” was a small but intensely beloved show during its eight season run from 2006 to 2014, to the point where it got not one, not two, but three television films to follow up on Shawn and Gus’ adventures: “Psych: The Movie” in 2017, “Psych 2: Lassie Come Home” in 2020 (which helped launch NBC Universal’s streaming service Peacock when it premiered right as the service launched), and “Psych 3: This Is Gus” in 2021. If you’re following up “High Potential” with “Psych,” there’s plenty of material out there for you to watch. 

Throughout “High Potential,” as Morgan Gillory helps the Los Angeles cops solve a variety of cases, she also enlists the help of the head of the unit, Selena Soto (Judy Reyes), to help find out what happened to her unseen (as of this writing) first husband Roman, who suddenly disappeared while buying daughters from their diaper. Tony Shalhoub’s Adrian Monk, the eponymous lead character of the USA Network hit “Monk,” would definitely find common ground with Morgan. Why? Well, he’s an offbeat consultant of sorts for the San Francisco Police Department as a private detective, and part of the reason that he’s so good at his job is his plethora of diagnoses, including obsessive-compulsive disorder and a whole host of phobias (within the show, these all help him become that much more observant). While he does his job, though, he’s constantly trying to solve a personal mystery: specifically, who killed his wife.

Aided by his loyal assistants assistants Sharona Fleming and Natalie Teeger (played by Bitty Schram and Traylor Howard, respectively), Adrian solves a whole host of crimes, and even though he’d probably be a little overwhelmed by Morgan’s energy, it’s easy to imagine them working together. If you love “High Potential,” go binge “Monk” — and don’t miss the 2023 film “Mr. Monk’s Last Case: A Monk Movie,” which serves as a perfect conclusion to Adrian’s story.

The second spin-off of “The Good Wife” — after “The Good Fight” — “Elsbeth” centers around Carrie Preston’s beloved character Elsbeth Tascioni, a lawyer who ends up working as a private investigator in this series also created by Robert and Michelle King. Armed with bright outfits and a can-do attitude, Elsbeth solves crimes in New York City after leaving Chicago, where the previous shows are set … though the show uses a different approach than a standard procedural. Instead of each episode being a “whodunit” that sends Elsbeth searching for a mysterious suspect or culprit, but a format you might not be quite as familiar with called a “howcatchem,” meaning that we learn who committed each crime right from the jump and even see how they did it and how they get caught, then backtracking to watch Elsbeth do what she does best.

Preston is truly irresistable as the titular Elsbeth, and though flanked by great TV veterans like Wendell Pierce, Gloria Reuben, and even Preston’s real-life husband and “Lost” alum Michael Emerson, she’s absolutely the reason to tune into “Elsbeth.” If you love how unconventional Morgan Gillory is on “High Potential,” you’ll definitely fall in love with Elsbeth.

If you love “High Potential” but you’re looking for a show focused on teenagers for whatever reason, you’ll definitely want to add “Veronica Mars” to your watchlist. Created by Rob Thomas and starring a young Kristen Bell in one of her career-defining roles, “Veronica Mars” sets up a fascinating world right out of the gate as Bell’s Veronica, in voiceover, explains the deeply divided and fictional California town of Neptune. Veronica, a “have-not,” used to hang with the wealthy and popular crowd until her best friend Lilly Kane was murdered (played in flashbacks by a phenomenal Amanda Seyfried) and Lilly’s brother Duncan ended his relationship with Veronica. Isolated from her former friends at school, Veronica starts working for her dad, disgraced former sheriff turned private investigator Keith Mars (a winning Enrico Colantoni), solving cases by his side while trying to solve mysteries very personal to her. In Season 1, that means Veronica figures out who really killed Lilly; in Season 2, she uncovers the culprit behind a devastating incident that sent a school bus full of students careening off a cliff.

“Veronica Mars” ended its original run after just three seasons but ultimately got a crowdfunded movie (in 2014) and a fourth season that features Veronica all grown up (which hit Hulu in 2019), so there’s plenty of “Veronica” content (“Verontent?”) out there for you to watch. Settle in, enjoy Bell’s snappy and clever voiceover, and see if you can solve the season-long mysteries along with her.

If Morgan Gillory on “High Potential” was also a human lie detector, she’d basically be Charlie Cade, the protagonist played by Natasha Lyonne on “Poker Face.” The show, created by modern whodunit master and “Knives Out” writer-director Rian Johnson, uses a case-of-the-week format as Charlie, who can always tell when someone’s lying, travels throughout the United States and takes odd jobs to avoid running into casino bosses Sterling Frost Jr. (two-time Academy Award-winner Adrien Brody) and his imposing father Sterling Frost Sr. (Ron Perlman), the second of whom has some questions to ask Charlie about a strange death at his business.

Because Charlie investigates a completely separate case in each episode of “Poker Face,” Lyonne and Johnson had the opportunity to call up a bunch of their famous friends and ask them to appear in one-off installments of the series … and that is precisely what they did. Besides a few recurring performers — like “The Big Bang Theory” alum Simon Helberg, who plays Luca Clark, a FBI agent who often helps Charlie solve cases — the first season of the show enlisted major stars like Chloë Sevigny, Judith Light, Ellen Barkin, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and Stephanie Hsu, just to name a few. The second upped the ante considerably, getting Cynthia Erivo, Margo Martindale, David Krumholtz, Giancarlo Esposito, John Mulaney, Richard Kind, and John Cho, among others. “Poker Face” is a perfect counterpart to “High Potential,” so definitely give it a shot if you haven’t.

After Jen Harding’s (Christina Applegate) husband is unexpectedly killed in a hit-and-run accident, she starts attending a grief group where she meets and befriends a woman named Judy Hale (Linda Cardellini), who claims that her husband also passed away recently. Turns out that Judy isn’t exactly telling the truth; not only is her ex-fiancé Steve Wood (James Marsden, who eventually plays Steve’s twin brother Ben as well) very much alive, but she was driving the car that killed Jen’s husband. Despite this decidedly rocky start, Jen and Judy form an incredibly close bond, basically becoming sisters as they navigate everything from relationships to motherhood to straight-up murder.

The best part of “High Potential” is that, as Morgan Gillory, Kaitlin Olson brings real human emotion and pathos to a character that could potentially be one-note in the hands of a lesser performer. To be clear, “Dead to Me” is brilliantly written, but no other actresses could have embodied Jen and Judy like Applegate and Cardellini, who became close friends off-screen as well (as Applegate struggled with real-life multiple sclerosis during production on Season 3 of “Dead to Me,” Cardellini was steadfastly by her side). “High Potential” features an unstoppable female lead character driven by grit and determination while still remaining wholly relatable, and “Dead to Me” has two of those female lead characters.

Though it was unjustly canceled by HBO Max after two short seasons, Kaley Cuoco’s first major post-“Big Bang Theory” project “The Flight Attendant” was a dark delight … and, like “High Potential,” is centered on a flawed but lovable woman trying to solve mysteries that are personal to them in some way. Cuoco plays the titular flight attendant Cassie Bowden, who works at a high-end airline while hiding her all-consuming alcohol addiction. In Season 1, after a wild night out in Bangkok with a wealthy and handsome passenger named Alex Sokolov (“Game of Thrones” veteran Michiel Huisman), Cassie wakes up in Alex’s hotel room only to discover that his throat was slit while he slept next to her. To clear her own name, Cassie is forced to figure out who really killed Alex while grappling with her own demons.

Season 2 isn’t quite as tightly written as Season 1, but it’s still gripping and enjoyable thanks to Cuoco’s considerable talent as an actress as she shows off a range that she never really got to exhibit on a sitcom like “The Big Bang Theory.” If you like complicated women solving crimes, don’t miss “The Flight Attendant.”

If you or anyone you know needs help with addiction issues, help is available. Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact SAMHSA’s National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).

“High Potential” is a pretty straightforward procedural but uses some neat stylistic tricks in his narrative, like “pausing” scenes to indicate how Morgan Gillory solves her crimes so quickly and successfully. If you like that, give the Apple TV+ comedy “The Afterparty” a chance, which employs a particularly fascinating narrative trick: each episode of each season looks at the exact same events from a different perspective. In the debut season, the titular afterparty takes place after a high school reunion and is hosted by Eugene Xavier Duckworth, Jr., now a movie star who simply goes by Xavier (Dave Franco); when Xavier is found dead at his own party, his former classmate and escape room designer Aniq Adjaye (a brilliant Sam Richardson) solves the murder while trying to win the affection of his high-school crush Zoë Zhu (Zoë Chao). 

Season 2 moves the afterparty to a party that takes place after a wedding, keeping Richardson and Chao on board and introducing a brand new set of characters. With Season 1 stars that include Ben Schwartz, Ike Barinholtz, and Ilana Glazer and Season 2 supporting players John Cho, Anna Konkle, and Zach Woods, “The Afterparty” feels fresh both times … though, sadly, Apple TV+ canceled it before its third season.

It’s hard to say whether or not Morgan Gillory from “High Potential” and Temperance “Bones” Brennan from “Bones,” played by Emily Deschanel, would be fast friends or hate each other; even though Temperance would probably lose patience with Morgan pretty quickly, the two still have quite a lot in common. On “Bones,” a procedural created by Hart Hanson, forensics expert and true crime author Temperance pairs up with special FBI agent Seeley Booth (David Boreanaz) to solve cold cases, utilizing the technology found at the Jeffersonian Institute (a fictional stand-in for the Smithsonian) where Temperance works.

Like “High Potential,” “Bones” perfectly marries cases-of-the-week with season-long mysteries, although it’s important to say that the villains on “Bones,” like the cannibal Gorgomon, are quite a bit scarier than most of the bad guys on “High Potential.” Still, if you’re jonesing between new seasons of “High Potential,” there are 12 seasons and nearly 250 episodes of “Bones” out there for you to binge.

Based on the literary detective created by Karin Slaughter, ABC’s “Will Trent” adaptation casts Ramón Rodríguez in the lead role — but it’s really the women of “Will Trent” who make this procedural series so special. As Will, who, like Morgan Gillory, is extremely observant, solves tricky cases, he’s surrounded by strong female characters like Erika Christensen’s homicide detective Angela Polaski (with whom Will has an on-again, off-again romance), Georgia Bureau of Investigation’s deputy director Amanda Wagner (played by Sonja Sohn), and, starting in Season 3, “Jane the Virgin” alum Gina Rodriguez as Will’s assistant district attorney. 

The women found in “Will Trent” don’t just help solve cases, but help Will learn more about himself in the process. If you have any familiarity with author Slaughter’s body of work, be aware that “Will Trent” can skew a lot darker than “High Potential,” but it’s also a gripping, snappy, and incredibly clever take on a modern procedural. Give “Will Trent” a try; it pairs perfectly with “High Potential.”

“High Potential” is streaming on Hulu now.