In a way, Court Martial was a belated spin-off from Kraft Suspense Theatre, as a 2-part episode from the latter series' 1st season featured the two leads of Court Martial, Peter Graves (ex-Fury) and Bradford Dillman. However, Court Martial landed on ABC instead of NBC, which was home to Suspense Theatre. Back in those days, it was not uncommon for a spin-off of a show to land on a different network from its parent.
Court Martial was a co-production between England's ITC and Roncom Productions, Perry Como's production company, on behalf of Universal, and would be the last new entry from Roncom, which had Run For Your Life and, presumably, Kraft Music Hall, on NBC at the time.
The format will look familiar, similar to a number of other crime dramas of the period, including the show it's most often compared to, Perry Mason.
Following is a sample episode:
Court Martial was a spring replacement series on ABC, airing on Friday nights, airing opposite The Man From U.N.C.L.E. over on NBC, which would explain why it wasn't picked up for the fall.
Another strike against it may have been that it was filmed in black & white, as the networks were going to color programming at that time.
Rating: A-.
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