(Premiering 3/1)
What's it about?
After Detective Michael Britten wakes up from a car accident with his wife and teenage son, he learns the devastating news that his wife died in the crash. Trying to put the pieces of his life back together, he wakes up a few days later to realize that his wife is very much alive and his son died in the accident! Did he lose his wife or his son? Or neither of them?? What if your life split in two in the face of a situation like this, and you could actually have everything you wanted, just not all at the same time?
You should watch if...
• you enjoy shows/movies about mind-bending alternate realities (see: FRINGE, LOST, SOURCE CODE, the COMMUNITY episode "Remedial Chaos Theory").
• you enjoy a sprinkling of meta-twists in your police procedurals.
So, how is it?
AWAKE has been getting rave reviews for months now from critics lucky enough to catch an advance screening of the pilot episode, so it's been on my hotly-anticipated list for quite a while. The pilot unexpectedly popped up in my Hulu queue this morning, so I finally got a chance to watch it before its actual premiere date of March 1st. And the premiere, at least, is just as good as I'd hoped it would be.
With a high concept unlike anything else on television, this show finds its protagonist, Michael, living two alternate realities: one where his wife survived a horrific car crash but his son died, and one where his son is still alive bu this wife passed away. Both are extremely real, and in both he is seeing therapists who insist that the other reality is merely a dream. The first episode offers no clues as to what is actually going on, but message boards are already ripe with speculation, with most people making guesses based off the previews alone. The predictions vary from: He's dead and in purgatory; to He's in a coma and it's all imagined; to They actually both died and this is his coping mechanism. The fact that there's such rampant, widespread and creative theories before the show has even officially premiered is indicative of its captivating hook.
As if that fascinating hook weren't enough by itself to keep me interested, everything else about the show is incredible as well. The performances are understatedly realistic to a man. Jason Isaacs (Lucius Malfoy to you Harry Potter fans) is terrific as Michael, who can't make heads or tails of his unprecedented situation -- but by the end of the first episode, he's come to the realization that he doesn't want to: he's perfectly happy with getting to see both his wife and son and doesn't want either of them to be a dream. Laura Allen (THE 4400, TERRIERS) is believable as Hannah, the grieving mother struggling haphazardly with ways to move on -- quitting her job, applying to school, painting her house, talking about having another child. Dylan Minnette reprises his role as the son in a parallel universe after his stint as Jack's sideways-world son on LOST -- he's even better here as Rex, the son coping with the sudden loss of his mother, taking up her favorite sport and bonding almost inappropriately with his new female coach. The widely varying actions of both Hannah and Rex make them not just sad archetypes but incredibly realistic characters struggling with complex coping mechanisms.
The supporting cast is rounded out by subtle, non-showy performances from Cherry Jones (24) and B.D. Wong (LAW & ORDER: SVU) as the two therapists, Michaela McManus (also of SVU) as Rex's tennis coach, and Steve Harris (THE PRACTICE) and Wilmer Valderrama (THAT 70'S SHOW) as Michael's coworkers on the police force.
Speaking of the police force... As if all the parallel worlds and two therapists and grieving family members weren't enough, AWAKE is also a police procedural. Michael is a homicide detective who is working on different cases in different timelines. One of the most intriguing moments of the pilot occurs when Michael realizes that details from the two very different cases are bleeding across realities. He uses these details to help solve the cases, but the question of how this is possible persists. I typically don't care for police procedurals, but this meta-twist may be enough to keep me interested this time.
Rating:
**** Certifiably ADDICTive. A must-see.
This show has everything going for it: an over-arching parallel-worlds mystery to intrigue the fans of serialized shows; the case-of-the-week format to hold the attention of procedural fans; consistently solid performances across the board; complex and layered writing of characters and timelines; and incredibly beautiful cinematography. There is nothing that I didn't like about the pilot, and I'm incredibly excited to see where this show goes next. By its very nature, AWAKE feels like it would work better as a movie or a miniseries than a multiple-seasons-long TV show. But the writers must have some idea of what they're doing, or NBC would never have greenlit the show. So I have faith that there are plenty of twists, turns and surprises in store for those of us patient enough to wait for them.
What about you, Fellow Addicts? If you're a procedural fan, did you enjoy the serialized nature of the parallel worlds story? And if you're a fan of serials, were you captivated by the meta-nature of the murder cases? What are your predictions for where this show will go next? Vote in the poll below and then hit the comments!
(For the complete rundown of when all the new shows are premiering, check out my 2012 Midseason TV Preview.)
No comments:
Post a Comment