Psych: The Movie, on USA Network
A.V. Club; IMDb; Wikia; Wikipedia
streaming sites: Google Play; iTunes; Peacock; Vudu

This first aired in December 2017, three years after the series Psych ended. It's set around Christmastime, so it kind of reminds me of the mid-to-late 2000s, when USA shows like Psych, Monk, and The Dead Zone would sometimes do holiday episodes in December while their regular seasons were on hiatus. (Man, it feels weird to be nostalgic for such a recent era.) But I don't really think of it as a holiday movie, because the holidays weren't important to the plot at all. Anyway, I didn't have USA Network when the movie aired, but I finally watched it in November 2021, on Peacock.

I suppose I should say that in the final season of the series, Chief Vick took a job as Chief of Police in San Francisco. At the end of the series, Shawn and Juliet got engaged, and they, along with Gus, moved to San Francisco, too. But the engagement ring Shawn wanted to give to Juliet was stolen. The movie begins with Shawn in disguise, stealing a bag of stolen jewelry from a fence, in search of his own stolen ring. It turns out not to be in the bag, which he gives back to the fence and his goons, before escaping from them. They'll show up again later a couple of times in the movie, but I don't want to talk about that. We also see Juliet stop a petty thief (who had stolen a phone), who turns out to be Vick's daughter, Iris. (She had been born in season one of the series, which I guess makes her about 11, in the movie). Juliet wants to tell Vick what Iris has been up to, but Iris convinces her not to.

Meanwhile, Gus has taken a new job, but still works part time with Shawn at their new detective agency, Psychphrancisco, which is located in an office designed to look like the shop from Gremlins. Anyway, at one point Juliet's partner, Sam Sloane, gets shot and ends up in the hospital. Shawn and Gus get involved with solving the case of who shot him. (And later, who killed him in the hospital.) Juliet doesn't want their help, but of course they investigate anyway. They soon learn that whoever shot Sam wants revenge against Juliet, but I won't spoil who or why. But I will say he has two goons working for him. (Shawn and Gus give all three of them nicknames: The Thin White Duke, Heather Rockrear, and Black Gentleman Ninja.) And the Thin White Duke ultimately turns out to be working with someone else who also wants revenge, but I won't spoil who that is, either. But she has the Duke kidnap Iris, to lure everyone to the place she intends to kill them. (It's not until they get there that they learn the Duke was working for someone else.) But of course the good guys (Shawn, Gus, Vick, Juliet, Henry, and Woody) win in the end. Oh, also I should mention that Gus meets a fellow astronomy enthusiast named Selene (I think that was pronounced something like "Selinay"), with whom he eventually starts a relationship (despite the fact that she doesn't believe Pluto should be considered a planet). And Lassiter (who is now Chief of Police back in Santa Barbara) makes a brief appearance via a phone call with Juliet. Also, Shawn eventually gets his ring back, though I won't say how. It's kind of ridiculous, but funny. And I guess I don't have anything more to say about the plot. But it all felt very much like an extended episode of the series, which is a good thing. I couldn't manage to love it like I did the original series, but I definitely liked it. (And okay, there were scattered moments of love.) It's very amusing, as always. And of course it was fun seeing a bunch of familiar characters again.

Followed by "Psych 2: Lassie Come Home", which was released as a Peacock original. Not sure if or when I might get to see that, since unlike this movie, I'd have to actually subscribe to Peacock to watch it.