Tag Archives: fall

Series premiere – Treadstone

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To understand the TV series Treadstone’s premise, you need to know a bit more about where the Treadstone idea orginated.

Robert Ludlum introduced the world to Jason Bourne through his novels, starting with The Bourne Identity in 1980. Two more sequels followed in 1986 and 1990, and after Ludlum’s death, Eric Lustbader added to the series with another DOZEN stories from 2004 to 2019. The initial book focused on Bourne as an undercover agent trying to capture the terrorist Carlos the Jackal by posing as a rival but fictitious assassin named Cain. Unfortunately, Bourne almost gets killed, develops amnesia, and can’t complete his mission, and while he is recuperating, the host agency running his operation thinks he’s turned traitor. That organization is called Treadstone.

When the new movies came out in 2002 with Jason Bourne played by Matt Damon, they altered the plot to create a series of Treadstone agents who volunteered to become super agents with advanced training, drugs, and psycho treatments aka brainwashing. Bourne still had amnesia in the movie, but it is more about him being an assassin FOR the government for black operations and he had a crisis of conscience just before he got injured. Treadstone still distrusts him, so they send other Treadstone agents against Bourne, and he has to hurt the organization hard to get them to leave him alone. Two more movies followed where first he thinks Treadstone is after him again, and another where a journalist is investigating Treadstone and a new thread called Blackbriar. The constant spectra of “Treadstone living on” vs. “Treadstone being shut down” continues in all the movies.

In 2012, they made a Bourne movie — but without Jason Bourne. The film was called The Bourne Legacy and added a new thread of agents called Operation Outcome that used meds to stimulate cognitive and physical abilities. Bourne exposed Treadstone more widely in movie #3, and the storyline is woven into the background of Legacy…Treadstone is dead, Blackbriar is exposed, and people decide to covertly shut down Outcome too. With extreme prejudice. A fifth movie just called Jason Bourne had Bourne again, but this time helping one of his original handlers who is in trouble as a potential whistleblower. Over the course of the film, Bourne learns more about the origins of the original Treadstone and how it worked.

Which brings us to 2019 and a new show called Treadstone. It’s hard to know the premise exactly, as certain storylines don’t quite match up. Basically, instead of Treadstone being the training of hard-core James Bond-level agents who can kill without hesitation, there is a Russian program called Cicada. These are sleeper agents who have no memory of their original lives or who they are until they are woken up to do a mission. A North Korean general knows that someone has an old Russian nuke aimed at the U.S. and is trying to get the launch codes, so he alerts the CIA to prevent an apocalypse, even while knowing it will likely sign his death warrant. 

 But here is where it gets weird in a long episode introducing a lot of disparate parts:

  • An ex-journalist is the one the DPRK general alerts, knowing she’ll be monitored by the CIA, and alerting the CIA that there’s something Treadstone-like called Cicadas who are being woken up, in addition to the problem of the nuke. In addition to the journalist, there’s her new handler, plus two senior officers within the CIA who are involved;
  • It’s flashback time to 1973, where an American agent somehow infiltrated the Cicada program, and escapes. Two flashbacks show what happened and who one of them is in the present time, but not the American agent;
  • In the present, a North Korean music teacher is activated or rather woken up as a Cicada agent in order to kill the DPRK general. Except she doesn’t know who she really is, or how she knows how to do stuff, or anything. She was activated blindly and given her assignment…the Cicada program is big on compliance over freedom of thought; and,
  • A fourth stream of people is an average Joe working on an oil rig and taking special yellow pills that keep on an even keel (aka like the meds from Outcome). Except he gets laid off, doesn’t take his meds, and when a Russian jerk starts a bar fight, the leatherneck breaks into Jason Bourne abilities and kicks the crap out of five guys. A kindly face helps clean him up after the fight, and basically resets him back into being a normal guy again, kind of like a form of Treadstone with Outcome meds and Blackbriar awakenings and compliance.

Now if you don’t know all that context before you get to the TV show, all you’ll see is that there are sleeper agents doing missions on both sides of the old Cold War, and the bad guys are trying to get control of a nuke. Bourne and the rest of the stuff is great if you know it, but they don’t tell you hardly ANY of it. In fact, all they basically say is that they thought they shut down Treadstone previously, and it turned out to be bigger than they originally expected.

So who is relevant in the story? Hard to tell. Jeremy Irvine plays the original American agent, Bentley. He’s okay in the episode, but mostly what he does is fight and escape. Tracy Ifeachor (DC’s Legends of Tomorrow) plays the ex-journalist, and while she seems good, she has very little screentime to get to know her. Her handler is played by Omar Metwally but he has even less screen time. Gabrielle Scharnitzky plays the older version of a Russian agent, while Emilia Schule plays the younger version. The younger version has presence, the older version is boring.

But the show will live or die by the two sleeper agents. For the Communists, it is a woman named SoYun played by Hyo-Joo Han. She actually does alright, and it is fun to see her transform from simple music teacher and mother/wife into Jane Bourne. For the Americans, it is Brian J Smith playing sleeping Doug McKenna. I liked Smith on Stargate Universe, and he is decent here, although a bit inconsistent since he doesn’t know what’s happening to him.

And just to round things out, as we can’t have Treadstone without figures back at Langley, we have Michelle Forbes as the potential good cop (hard to believe she was Ro Laren on ST:TNG all the way back in ’91-94 and I wouldn’t have recognized her if I hadn’t seen her name in the credits) and Michael Gaston (a really great cynical white guy, although I liked him better as a Red John suspect in the Mentalist).

So where does that leave me? Certainly it is not well-paced for plotting and characters. If you didn’t know any background, you’d be thoroughly confused all the way through the episode. I DID know and I was still confused. Yet, I was already “all in” as soon as it was announced. I predicted cancellation as it seemed like it was going to be more about a one-man army, which lots of shows try every year and they all fail. However, with the addition of other competing agents, I’m going to reverse my prediction and say that USA might renew it.

Either way, I’ll be watching.

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Series premiere – The Unicorn

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The premise for The Unicorn was listed as recent widower re-enters the dating world. Umm…wait a minute, didn’t I see that last year? It was called Single Parents or something? Okay, let’s go with cancellation.

Except I didn’t realize it was Walton Goggins as the widower. I absolutely loved him as Boyd Crowder on Justified. Sure, he’s been in lots of other shows, but none that I watched regularly. One of the elements in Justified that I loved was his comedic moments — playing straight while the world crashed around him. So I was definitely willing to give him a shot. 

Then, in passing, my wife mentioned having watched the premiere even though she watches almost nothing regularly, and not being too impressed with the show. I still went for it, with my expectations low.

But I like him. I like seeing him in the new show, I like him on screen. He’s not completely goofy or over the top. And even his kids mostly work — Ruby Jay as the older sister Grace and Makenzie Moss as the younger sister Natalie.

The episode spends a bit of time getting to the premise of the show which is Wade starting to date again. His wife has been gone a year, he’s working all the time or spending time with the kids, mostly eating frozen meals that people gave them after his wife died. And he’s down to the last frozen meal. His wacky friends help him prepare an online profile as a six foot cuddler who is widowed. So his phone blows up — he’s a unicorn. A single guy, devoted father, no emotional divorce baggage or lots of singlehood issues, looking to date. With a job. Until he realizes that they want to date him because he’s widowed. He feels like he’s using his wife’s death to get new dates, so he goes back to setting his profile to simply single instead of widowed. And his first date goes awkward fast.

Yet here’s the thing. Most scenes in sitcoms would make that awkward scene be incredibly embarrassing. Beyond awkward, almost geeky, painful even to watch. The show didn’t do that. They played it straight, it’s resolved easily enough with some side humour thrown in, and the date is “saved” through honesty and transparency. Leading to a fantastic set of lines where she’s inviting him over for sex, he realizes he’s not ready yet, and she notes that he’s really sweet, etc. Then she tries to rationalize maybe he’s having a mid-life crisis and perhaps he drives a Porsche. Nope, he says, a dirty pickup. For her? “You’re so hot.” Not raucous laughter, sure, but the scene and the joke work.

Him with his family? Awesome. But the friends are a disaster. Couple one is Rob Corddry (white guy trying to be hip) and Michaela Watkins (Casual) as a bit weird neurotic. Couple two is Omar Benson Miller (Walter from CSI: Miami) who is a bit hip and yet lovable and Maya Lynne Robinson is a cliche as a frazzled mother of 4 kids. They’re barely tolerable to watch, and no real humour in any of them, but at least Goggins gets to play it innocently straight with them.

In the end, my wife is right. Not that great and I’ll predict cancellation. Yet I’ll be watching until it is cancelled. Cuz it’s Goggins.

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Series premiere – Sunnyside

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So the basic premise that I had for Sunnyside was a city councilman finds a new calling or something with a group of immigrants applying for citizenship. It didn’t seem like it would have anywhere to really go, so I predicted cancellation. Now that I have watched the opening episode, cancellation was a generous prediction. I’m surprised the makers of the show are not in receivership with the studio asking for their money back.

Kal Penn is the lead as the councilman and I generally love him. And no, not from Harold and Kumar. I liked him on How I Met Your Mother, The Big Bang Theory, and more importantly, Designated Survivor. So when I saw it was him, I was hopeful. But the character is TERRIBLE. Disgraced councilman who spent 15 years freeloading on the public dime, only to get booted off council following a drunk and disorderly charge and a viral video. But he hasn’t changed. He doesn’t care about anyone but himself and that continues for most of the episode. Right up until the end when he SUDDENLY decides he does care, because his sister told him to? No catalyst, just an epiphany and now he’s a supposed good guy. Meh.

The rest of the cast is completely forgettable, one trick ponies. From the replacement councilwoman who is likely to be a future romantic interest to the Asian stereotypes to the surgeon turned cab driver. Yawn. The ONLY character that is the least bit interesting is Griselda, played by Diana Maria Riva — she has tons of different jobs. In just about every scene, she’s working. It’s cute and it works.

But the show has the biggest problem of all — it ain’t funny. Which would be fine if it wasn’t a supposed sitcom. On that front, it is unforgivable. Cancellation would seem guaranteed.

And it was — it’s already been cancelled.

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Series premiere – Nancy Drew

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Sigh. I love mystery stories, and series in particular. So when I saw that a new version of Nancy Drew was coming, I thought, “Cool beans.” I’d give it a go. I totally missed that it was on the CW, which would have given me a clue as to the type of show it would be. It is definitely not your parents’ Nancy Drew. This is more ND, by way of Stranger Things or The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. Yep, there’s a supernatural element.

Here’s the skinny. Nancy Drew is in Horseshoe Bay, Maine, and has grown up solving mysteries. But she’s 18, time for college, right? Nope, Mom died of cancer, and it kind of put her college on hold for a year. So she’s waitressing and using boy toy Ned “Nick” Nickerson for sex. Her and her dad are estranged, she’s just marking time until she can go off to college, and she has given up her detective days.

Well, until the pilot, when a local rich boy comes into the diner after hours for a quick meeting while his wife waits outside, only for her to wind up dead. The Sheriff thinks Nancy and her friends are involved, although really he’s just busting their chops because ND has been a pain in his side for awhile. Nancy plans to stay out of the case, but well, she dabbles. Until it turns out her BF might have a motive. Now she’s all in on whodunnit, drawing up lists, predicting motives and means. The Game is Afoot. And just for fun, a dead girl haunts her with clues.

Nancy Drew is played by relative newbie Kennedy McMann and she does an okay job through the episode. She’s a little uneven in the role, but that should adjust over time (bopping from Veronica Mars one minute to space cadet the next, and don’t get me started on the relationship angst). Not that entertaining for that part, but whatever.

Her boyfriend / boytoy Nick is played by Tunji Kasim and he is even more inconsistent. Angry one second, hurt another, loving a third. Whatever. The rest of the “friends” group isn’t much better…Leah Lewis as Georgia (I have only seen her in an episode of The Gifted), Maddison Jaizani as Bess (also from Into the Badlands), Alvina August (Sabrina!) as Detective Hart, Scott Wolf as Nancy’s dad (terrible chemistry with the daughter), and Adam Beach as the police chief (wtf?). Pamela Sue Martin apparently showed up in the episode as Harriet, and I have NO idea who that was in the Ep. She’s a throw-back for nostalgia as she used to play Nancy Drew in earlier shows (70s).

So, I was expecting a procedural “mystery of the week”, kind of like Veronica Mars or a younger version of Murder, She Wrote. Instead, it is much more Sabrina than that. Which isn’t bad, I guess, just not really Nancy Drew to me. Almost like X-Files in some ways although she’s not really interested in the ghost stuff, just what the clues can tell her.

I predicted renewal, and I’ll stick with that. I may even watch the rest of the episodes to see if it turns out to be who I think it is (Detective Hart, the one protecting Nancy). Motive? I have no idea. Maybe the woman lied in a case and Hart put the wrong person in jail. That’s what I’m going with for now.

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Series premiere – Emergence

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Ever since Lost went big, various networks try to come up with the “viral” show that will hold viewers. Alcatraz. Time travellers. Time loops. Plane disappearances and reappearances. So not surprisingly, the networks are trying again this year. I already wrote about one (Series premiere – The I-Land) and why I passed. Emergence had a slightly different take on it, which was a plane crash of some sort with only one survivor. A girl. With supposed amnesia and not a scratch on her.

But that wouldn’t be enough for the weird. Just before the plane crash, all the electronics in the nearby town went haywire. After the crash, some supposed NTSB people showed up and tried to take the girl, before the real NTSB people showed up. Meanwhile, the local police chief is protecting the girl. Dun dun dun. There’s other stuff happening, people trying to kidnap the girl, etc., and a reporter guy running around. Plus the girl seems to have some weird abilities — communicating with the TV, freaking out and causing stuff to move (telekinesis), and stopping a moving vehicle dead. Plus she never gets hurt. Cool beans. At the end of the episode, she goes into the bathroom and CUTS HER NECK to remove some sort of tracking tube or interface module that was glowing, without screaming or crying. DUN DUN DUN. Oh, and btw, she also can look at the police chief’s father and see that he has cancer that isn’t being cured.

Allison Tolman plays the police chief, Joanne Evans. She’s separated from her husband, and living with her daughter and dad. For her acting, I have to divide it in three segments. When she’s investigating, she’s a bit meek, but fine to watch. When she’s interacting with family and others, she’s quiet and speaks way too slowly. It’s like watching paint dry. And then when she’s with the girl, she seems like Ellen Degeneres voicing Dory. If I close my eyes, I hear Ellen. It’s very relaxing, and it works. But she does it like FOUR times in the episode. I get it, you can bond with the kid. Please stop. I’ve seen her in nothing else, but some parts here are hard to take.

Alexa Swinton plays the young girl, nicknamed Piper since they don’t know her real name. Swinton is fine, but she really doesn’t have much to do except look scared for most of the episode, with no emotional range except for one freak-out scene. Definitely need more scenes between her and the chief’s daughter. Haven’t seen her in anything before, she’s okay here.

Other actors and characters include:

  • Ashley Aufderheide as the chief’s daughter, okay;
  • Robert Bailey, Jr, as a young police officer, also okay;
  • Zabryna Guevera as a doctor, although I liked her better on New Amsterdam and Gotham; and,
  • Donald Faison as the ex-husband, who has a lot of series experience, none of which I saw, also okay.

Clancy Brown plays the Dad, and I liked him a lot in Sleepy Hollow as Sheriff Corbin. He’s always solid, even way back to Highlander as Kurgan, although he’s a bit of a caricature as a General on The Flash. Nice to see him here, although not sure about the role of the character.

The other main character is the supposed reporter, Benny, played by Owain Yeoman. I loved him on The Mentalist, and love him using his natural accent here. He doesn’t have a huge part yet, but I’m hoping that grows. I’m curious if he is supposed to develop a love interest with the Chief, but I hope not, she had no chemistry with him at all.

So where does that leave us? A couple of solid veterans to support the relatively newbie cast, two leads with limited emotive range, and a decent plot. Except I don’t see where it can go after Season 1. My original prediction was cancellation, and I’m going to stick with that. But I like it enough to watch for the plot.

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Series premiere – Batwoman

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The DC Universe on TV burst out with Arrow, added Flash, added DC Legends of Tomorrow, added Supergirl, added Black Lightning, and this season has gone full series for Batwoman. And, while Arrow is ending, a “birds of prey” by another name is set to spin off too. Since I like superhero shows and the tropes they follow, I tend to watch all of them. I’m not a equal fan of all of them, but I enjoy them. Arrow used to be dark, and I liked the difference. Flash is white innocence, as is Supergirl, while DC Legends is quirky and irreverent. I like Black Lightning probably least of all, as it seems more campy as they figure out their powers — less super hero than people with fun tech or mutants with glitz. Anyway. I love the Bat, so I was definitely going to be all in for Batwoman. Heck, I even watched Gotham and have burned through Season 1 of Pennyworth.

Yet, I’m not steeped in Batman lore. I have no idea all the different versions, nor the various links with Robin incarnations, and no idea why “Batman has left Gotham” three years ago as the story opens. But Kate Kane is his cousin (cute, huh? kind of like Kara and Clark) and while she didn’t know that Bruce was Batman, she loved him and hated Batman after Batman failed to save her and her family after a bus crash from the Joker (he thought he had saved them until the car materials gave way and the car fell).

Anyway, Kate is a badass who has been training to be a super private soldier in her father’s company, training all over the world kind of like the Dark Knight backstory (in the Christian Bale version of the Bat). She returns to Gotham, discovers Bruce’s lair, puts on the suit to protect the city and her family. A lot happens in the first episode, and overall it’s great.

Ruby Rose plays Kane, and other than other EPs of the DC shows, the only thing I had seen her in was Dark Matter where she played a kickass android. She was awesome in that EP, but it is her presence that defines her performance. She owns almost every scenes she’s in. I confess I was less impressed in a scene where she’s strung up and talking to Alice, the villain, and she didn’t look awesome in the first view of her in the suit when she’s not fighting. It seems awkward to me.

The villain, Alice, is played by Rachel Skarsten and I am a little embarrassed when it comes to her. Every time I see her, I can’t place her. AT ALL. Which makes no sense. I really only had a reason to pay attention when she played Tamsin on Lost Girl. She was fantastic, loved her and loved her various episodes. I went back and binged Birds of Prey at one point, and didn’t recognize her. Sure she was ten years younger, but still. She was also in The Listener, didn’t recognize her. Republic of Doyle, nope, no clue. Wynonna Earp, no clue. And here as Alice? Nope, couldn’t place her. Sigh. I generally love her, and while I even like her fight scenes, the fight scene here with Batwoman wasn’t that great. And it was no surprise ** spoiler alert ** to find out that she was Kane’s supposedly dead sister, as soon as they said they never found her body. They held that detail back or it would have been WAY too obvious upfront. Meh.

There are a bunch of other roles buried in there:

  • Camrus Johnson as Luke Fox, aka Alfred to her Batwoman;
  • Elizabeth Anweis as a flaky step mom;
  • Nicole Kang as a weird, completely inconsistent step-sister — one minute flighty, one minute suburban underground clinic doctor; and,
  • Meagan Tandy as a previous GF of Kane’s.

None of them are really worth writing about, but they were all fine. The only real other role in the pilot is that of Kane’s father, played by Dougray Scott. I don’t recognize him, although there’s a cute in-joke in the opener that his character is showing Zorro in the park, and Scott played in the Zorro TV series back in the day. Most of the episode, he seemed like a low-rent Russell Crowe wannabe, but he’s okay. Nothing great. If he turns out to be an evil Doc Ock-like turncoat, that will work probably just as well.

Will I watch? Yes. That was a given. Was it great? For the genre, sure. Will I predict renewal? Of course, it’s the CW and all the DC shows get renewed.

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Series premiere – Stumptown

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I love private investigator stories, pretty much in any form. Give me a PI, lawyer, military investigator, mentalist, profiler, detective, mystery writer, psychic, whatever you want, if they’re investigating crime, I’m willing to give it a go. So ABC has a new PI show called Stumptown, takes place in Portland, and focuses on an ex military intelligence type who might be able to help people who don’t want to go to the police. It’s well-trod ground, all the way from the Busted Flush to the A-Team. If you have a problem. If nobody else can help. And if you can find her, maybe you can hire…Cobie Smulders?

Yeah, that was my reaction too. I liked Smulders on How I Met Your Mother. And I mostly hate her whenever she’s in the Marvel universe. Nor did I consider it a positive when she showed up on Andromeda. So…PI show on the one hand, Smulders on the other. Sigh. Let’s give it a go. Maybe I’ll be surprised.

And I was. She didn’t suck. Hardly high praise, but she was watchable. She plays it relatively straight, no fake comedic bits, albeit a bit cynically wry at times. Sure, she’s got PTSD of some sort, and her ability to fake that or pull off a sex scene isn’t great. But the PI side? Decent enough to watch.

But every PI needs a cop foil, and hers are two-fold — first up is Michael Ealy as the good cop and love interest / sex partner. I enjoyed him in Almost Human, skipped Common Law, and liked him in Flashforward. Here he is good, although his character is a bit uneven for Ep1. His boss, Camryn Manheim, basically scowls at people the whole time, which she has done lots of times before. Way back at the start of The Practice, she was decent, but I lost interest in the series and she was part of the reason. Not a plus for me, but she has a limited role here and it’s fine.

The rest of the cast is okay. Her friend Grey seems too good to be true — best friend? Something more? Curious if they’ll later reveal he’s either gay or has had a crush on her for years. Played by Jake Johnson, a little too earnest at times. Her brother Ansel is played by Cole Sibus, and is a maturing influence on Smulders character as she has to take care of him (unexplained condition, likely Down Syndrome or equivalent, and I like that they don’t explain it). And some people from the local reserve, Tantoo Cardinal (as the casino owner) and Gregory Zaragoza (as her right hand). Cardinal is decent, although mostly she just has to seem old and wise, with a bit of disdain for others.

Overall, I liked the show. Because of Smulders, I originally predicted cancellation. Unfortunately for me, I’ll be watching anyway but I think cancellation was the right call. I just don’t see enough meat in the show to get to renewal.

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Series premiere – First Wives Club

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The original First Wives Club back in ’96 had a strong revenge motive as its plot. Three divorced women reunite, have each others back, and decide to get back at the husbands who dumped them for younger models. The TV series has some of that same premise in the pilot, with three friends getting together when one has a very public meltdown against her husband and the video goes viral.

Ryan Michelle Bathe plays Friend #1, Ari, who in the pilot is married to an up and coming Senatorial candidate. She has left her law practice to run his campaign, and is doing her best to make it happen, an equal partner to his movement forward, despite being totally bored with him. She’s decent, but hard to get a handle on who she is or what she wants as a character.

Michelle Buteau plays Friend #2, Bree, who is separated from her husband Gary after finding out that he cheated on her. Gary is still chasing after her, wanting to get back together, go to therapy, etc. but she’s having none of it. In the opener, she matches a Sex in the City-like plot and gets a new man to rock her world for a night. Bree is okay, but not a lot going on with her in the episode — she’s struggling to balance her family life as a single mom but it seems more plot device than realistic.

Jill Scott plays Friend #3, Hazel, who is married to a record producer husband Derek. Derek and Hazel are tussling because Hazel is working on a comeback album, and she gets her release date bumped for a young artist that Derek is trying to sleep with too. Hazel and Ari work out a bit of revenge, and the Ep ends with it escalating badly against Hazel. War has begun.

As an aside, of the males running around the show, the only one with any presence is Malik Yoba as husband #3, Derek. I loved him on Defying Gravity and he was good on Designated Survivor, and I even liked him way back on Alphas.

So, at the end of Ep 1, you have Ari supposedly solidly but unhappily married, Bree separated and moving on, and Hazel feuding with her husband. It didn’t exactly ring “organized revenge” to me, and I have no idea where this could go after Season 1. I didn’t get a good feel for any of them and while I’m not the intended demographic, I’m going to keep with my original cancellation prediction. I know, it’s on BET+, and they’ll likely renew everything this year, but hey, for now, I’m saying cancellation.

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Series premiere – Prodigal Son

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There are a lot of profiler shows that have come and gone. Some work, some don’t. They often try for a twist. A woman who grew up not knowing who her father was who suddenly is confronted with the FBI’s most wanted man saying he’ll only speak to her. An agent who investigated a series of murders until it consumed them and now they’re back. A victim who became a counsellor or an agent or an actual profiler. 

Or, in this case, the son of a serial killer who became an FBI profiler and was fired for breaching protocol. I wasn’t convinced it would work, so I predicted cancellation.

Tom Payne plays the titular son, Malcolm. I didn’t see him in The Walking Dead so he’s a fresh face for me. Decent, a little unsteady in his performance, but interesting character and watchable as an actor.

His boss is played by Lou Diamond Phillips and I think he does a great job.  I confess I’m hit or miss with LDP. I found him weak on Blue Bloods, so-so on Blindspot, watchable on Stargate: Universe, painful on Numb3rs, and okay for Young Guns. It’s not like his breakout in La Bamba. But he was okay here. Plays it straight, no curves, and it seems to fit better. Other coworkers include Aurora Perrineau, Keiko Agena, and Frank Harts. I didn’t get a fix on any of them, hard to tell.

His family consists of a sister, mother and of course the psycho father. The sister, Ainsley, is played by Halston Sage and I was struggling to place her at all. I just couldn’t figure out who she was, but she seemed so familiar. Of course, without all the alien makeup from Orville, she looks a bit different. Decent, but a bit weak of a character in the pilot.  Bellamy Young plays the mom, Jessica, and she has definite presence but not sure I care for the character much. Watching her, I also struggled to place her. Sure, I saw her in Dirty Sexy Money. But going back through her credits, I realized it was an episode of Cold Case where she played a housewife turned dance hall girl during the Depression and the subsequent War of the Worlds. She lit up the screen for that episode. Hope to see more of THAT here.

Finally, Hannibal Lecter, err, I mean Dr. Martin Whitly aka the serial killer father nicknamed The Surgeon is played by Michael Sheen. I haven’t watched Good Omens yet so hadn’t seen him there. I didn’t watch The Good Fight or Masters of Sex, so hadn’t seen him there either. Nor any of the other long list of roles. But for me, he is the weakest of the characters. There is almost zero menace or intrigue for his portrayal at all. More like milquetoast than Hannibal. He’s almost pathetic. Put differently, he shows no presence or gravitas to create a mythic figure for his son or his family.

Overall, I saw enough for me to keep watching. Unfortunately, I didn’t see enough to predict renewal.

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Series premiere – Undone

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I have almost no idea how to review the Amazon show, Undone. I predicted cancellation, but I’m going to wait a minute to tell you why. Let’s look at the show first.

The premise of the show is a young woman, Alma, whose life is a bit disappointing to her. She lives with her boyfriend, Sam, and she wakes up every morning next to the same man, has a shower, brushes her teeth, eats the same cereal, takes the same commute, and she’s terrified this is all there is for the rest of her life. She also has a lot of complicated baggage from her past — her father died when she was young (car crash, apparently), and his mother was schizophrenic. So Alma is afraid that getting married and having kids is too big a risk in case she either dies on them or becomes like her grandmother. When her sister gets engaged, Alma is confused about why Becca would take such a risk. It ends up in some self-destructive behaviour, lots of dysfunctional family stuff, and eventually a sister fight. Driving away, Alma is in a car crash of her own and sees her father.

So here’s the issue. First, the show is sitcom-length, but definitely not a sitcom. No real jokes, more drama, or more pointedly, more dysfunctional interactions without the 22-minute “everything is resolved” ending. Second, while it isn’t described in the first episode, I’ve seen some of the descriptions of the later episodes, and there’s a weird sci-fi / fantasy element. Yep, she really saw Dad, or a ghost, or something. But the final point is the real question mark…it’s an animated show.

No, go ahead, take a minute to let that percolate in your brain. We’re not talking Family Guy or the Simpson’s, or Futurama, or pretty much any other animated show out there. This is a full-on half-hour drama show about Alma’s life spinning out of control (literally, her car crash involves a car spin!), and it just happens to be animated.

I would be hard-pressed to predict renewal for the show, simply based on the writing or plot. There are too many gaps in the first episode to hook the right audience (Dr. Who or Star Trek watchers perhaps). And the animation was not even the typical cartoon animation you see. It was more like Sim Life turned into a TV show.

And so I have to predict cancellation. I just don’t see how it can succeed. Yet there’s a time travel concept buried in it, so I will likely watch to see what happens. I don’t know why. But I will. I just don’t think anyone else will stick around to the end.

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