My 50 Favorite Classic TV Characters: James Garner as Jim Rockford

You may have heard that a reboot of The Rockford Files has been picked up by NBC and will debut in January, with David Boreanaz playing ex-con turned private investigator Jim Rockford. Boreanaz has an impressive TV track record, and as a fan of both Buffy and Angel I think that casting is about the best we could hope for – given the current state of entertainment media we should just be glad it’s not Kevin Hart.There was probably a time I would have been excited, or at least intrigued, by the prospect of a new take on a classic show. But after the reboots of Magnum and Matlock and Walker I no longer trust today’s crop of writers and producers to deliver a series that would capture even 10% of the appeal of the original.Could Boreanaz still make it watchable? Perhaps – but it’s hard to imagine he could achieve the same indelible impression as James Garner’s portrayal of Jim Rockford. One reason it worked so well is that Garner already had experience in the same type of character. In…