You can make him basically a comic-book figure (like 007, at least up until the 2006 “Casino Royale” movie, or pretty much any character Arnold Schwarzenegger has ever played), or you can give him some emotional shading and a dramatic backstory (like Bourne or Jack Bauer of “24”).

The creators of “Human Target” try to split the difference, giving their hero an implausible collection of physical and mental skills but also giving him a possibly sinister past and a tragic knowledge of the dark side of the human soul.

Fortunately, the action elements of the show are good enough to please an audience of young males and eternal adolescents. The more grown-up elements feel half-hearted and probably won’t succeed in broadening the show’s appeal to women or other viewers who like their characters to be more than paper thin.

In the series, which is getting a sneak preview this Sunday at 8 p.m. on Fox (just before the season premiere of “24”), the where-have-I-seen-him-before actor Mark Valley plays Christopher Chance, a super-secret freelance bodyguard hired by powerful people when they believe someone is trying to kill them.

In the DC comic books on which the series is based — as well as in a previous TV version starring the singer-actor Rick Springfield that aired briefly in 1992 — Chance would disguise himself as his clients, hence the title. Perhaps because that would seem too comic-booky, Chance now merely assumes a false identity that allows him to get in the line of fire.

In the premiere episode, Chance poses as the interpreter for a gorgeous mechanical engineer on the maiden voyage of the high-speed train she designed. In the second episode, airing Wednesday at 9, Chance has to board an airplane to find and protect a hacker who can break into any computer in the world.

Chance is not only skilled in hand-to-hand combat, as shown in the well-shot and well-choreographed fight scenes; he can also speak fluent Japanese, fly an airliner and assemble MacGyver-style gizmos when he’s in a jam.

Chance also stays one step ahead of the audience in figuring out who the assassins are. The plot twists, it should be noted, are only moderately twisty.

Scenes of flirtation suggest that Chance is attractive to the ladies, but in the first two episodes, there’s none of that icky kissing stuff.

Valley’s conventional TV-hero good looks suit the character. He hasn’t lost the skill for light comedy that he showed when he starred in the short-lived 2003 detective series “Keen Eddie.”

Most of the comedy involves Chance’s relationship with his business partner, Winston, played by Chi McBride, who draws on the same repertoire of glowers and slow burns that he used as the detective in “Pushing Daisies.”

The diminutive actor Jackie Earle Haley, who was nominated for an Oscar for his portrayal of the sex offender in “Little Children,” is surprisingly convincing as Chance’s associate Guerrero, a hacker type who can intimidate bigger and tougher people into doing his bidding.

Where the show fails is in trying to give Chance depth. In the first two episodes, it is hinted that he may have a death wish or may be trying to achieve redemption for some unspecified wrongs he committed in a past life, during which, presumably, he acquired all those secret-agent skills. Nothing in Valley’s performance, however, suggests that Chance is particularly tormented or that he could ever have hurt a fly, unless the fly was involved in a plot to kill an innocent person.

This wouldn’t be an issue if “Human Target” were paired with “24” or another procedural drama. But the show’s regular time slot is at 8 p.m. on Wednesdays, leading into “American Idol;” what’s more, the premiere is going to be rerun at 9 next Tuesday, after “Idol,” and the second episode will run at 9 next Wednesday, again after “Idol.”

The girly girls and boys who make up the core “Idol” audience are unlikely to fall for a Bourne Lite character like Chance. “Human Target” would probably be safer on Friday, a night of diminished expectations when its likely audience probably isn’t going to be out on dates or anything.