Revolution
Season One
Episode One
'Pilot' - 3.0
I've always loved starting new shows. With most people, it takes a few episodes before they decide whether or not a show is worthwhile, but the pilot gives you that one point in the show when you can make any assumptions about it that you want, without worrying about there being more information in past episodes or any prior notions that you are contradicting. Thus, we have the first episode of the new post-apocalyptic drama series 'Revolution', which I'm determined to see through the first season of, regardless of quality. Hell, bad episodes are more fun to write about.
One issue with pilots is that you have to remember all these names, faces, locations and situations that you'll generally have no chance of knowing prior to watching the show. I wrote down everything I thought was important and I still don't have the names for every important character we met. First things first though; was it any good? Well... it's alright.
To be honest, I was definitely intrigued by the prospect of a modern world where humanity has been stripped of its literal power, preventing cars, computers, phones, fridges, production lines, anything involving electricity from working. Don't think too hard about it, the premise really doesn't make that much sense when you consider it. Like, if power just stopped flowing, we would die. Electrical impulses cross synapses in our bodies which allow us to feel, react, move and think. Not all cars need electricity to run. Is there still lightning? I'm aware that's static electricity (I think, isn't it?), but you get the idea. There isn't much point in obsessing over the science of it all.
Revolution is one of those shows that attempts to get by on only a detailed and potential epic tale, believing that it doesn't need to spend long periods going over characterisation or dialogue. It's a shame, because the executive producer is JJ Abrams, who I know can write an excellent character drama, yet Revolution just... isn’t.
In the first scene we meet the a family living in modern Chicago; Ben is the father, Danny is the youngest and Charlotte the oldest. The mother I can't remember the name of, or maybe it wasn't said out loud, all I know is that she is played by Elizabeth Mitchell, who was one of the best actresses on Lost in her role as morally ambiguous Dr. Juliet Burke. Tonight though, she's only in the few flashbacks we get to see.
Everything is all right for about two minutes, but I have to hand it to the show - they get onto it fast. Ben arrives home and throws his junk onto the table, immediately getting out his phone to call his brother, who is driving down a freeway with a marine colleague or something. Apparently all the power's about to go out - big shock there, considering what we know the show to be about - but before Ben can warn his brother Miles, the blackout hits, severing the connection. The shots of the power disappearing were fairly awe-inspiring, with the darkness sweeping through cities like a wave. Miles and his friend's perspective of the headlights going out along the busy freeway was my favourite, as the camera panned up the length of the road, slowly revealing the horizon and the faint glinting lights of falling airplanes.
Seconds later, we flash forward to fifteen years after the event, with our protagonist seemingly Ben, who has become a worried and protective father of Charlotte or 'Charlie' and Danny, the latter is revealed to have asthma. Elizabeth Mitchell is said to have died, and the new matriarch is a British-accented medical doctor who treats Danny's asthma attack with herbs. Ben is eternally fearful of bandits and the militia which have arisen in the last few years and forbids his kids from venturing to close to the road or too far away.
They live in a makeshift commune with a whole bunch of other unrelated people, only one of whom is revealed to be at all important; Aaron, some fat guy who we later find out was a multimillionaire who worked for Google. I guess he's the Hurley of this show.
A normal day for the farming community is ruined when a local militia arrives, loyal to whatever the hell the 'Monroe Republic' is. This small group is led by some stereotypically macho, badass dude who comes looking for Ben Matheson, as well as his brother Miles who is clearly not at the township. Ben hands a small device – seen to be a flash drive in the initial scene - to Aaron and tells him not to let it fall into the wrong hands. Badass guy threatens Ben with the conscription and re-education of his children, and he agrees to go with them. Unfortunately this is television and it can never be that simple, and idiot teenager (there is always one) Danny pulls out a crossbow and tells the bad guy - let's call him the 'dude' - to leave. Danny obviously failed to realise how well armed this militia is, and his insolence leads to a bullets and arrows crossfire, catching heaps of innocent people as well as members of both sides. In a sudden moment that I admit was a tad shocking, Ben is shot and Danny is taken away by the men.
Charlie had heard all of the commotion and comes running back to the farm, finding her father dying and her brother apprehended by a rogue military. Ben tells her to find his brother in Chicago and save Danny, and thus begins what I assume to be the main plot of the show.
Charlie, blond girlfriend and Aaron, the only living and named people from the commune all leave together, dooming the town to a series of little to no future appearances. Young adult Charlie seems alright as a protagonist, though there doesn't seem to be much going on under the surface. I don't mind her, but she's kind of dull and overt in her nuances, and I can see the contradiction there. What I'm saying is people don't just shout out what motivates them and how they feel all the time, but Charlie, and almost all the other characters on this show do.
Along the surprisingly short journey to Chicago, Charlie meets muscle bound, confident archer Nate, an obvious future love interest. They come together at a waterfall where she had come for water, with the two of them officially meeting in the single most clichéd greeting I've ever seen; she hears him and hides behind a pile of rocks. He doesn't appear to notice her, but without turning says something like 'you know most people just say good morning'. I could have turned the show off then.
The three continue on, with Nate having little more to do than playful banter in his one scene so far. Charlie, Aaron and other woman spend the night in an airplane they come across on the outskirts of Chicago, only to awaken with three bandits holding knives to their throats. Doctor chick offers them a bottle of whiskey she keeps in her bag - cause why not - which they happily drink, before Mr. Ring Leader drags Charlie off for some erotic play. As she begins to put up a bit of a struggle, the other two start suffering the effects of some poison the woman had put in the alcohol, with her strangling one of the incapacitated men herself. The one trying to get on top of Charlie gets an arrow through his chest by Nate, who had apparently followed them from the waterfall.
Our now four person strong group heads into the desolate ruins of Chicago, with some well designed but not well shot scenes depicting how the city has decayed. I felt that a moving camera would have been more breathtaking, with most of what we see looking like an OK painting. A fluid tracking shot through the overgrown and/or flooded metropolis would have been epic, something that shows the devastation more significantly than a couple static shots of badly computer generated plants imposed on Chicago streets.
Eventually they arrive at the location Ben gave them, finding Miles acting as a bartender while 'keeping a low profile'. Miles is clearly supposed to be the good-guy badass who is reluctant to help people out because that's not the sort of person he is. He's Sawyer from Lost, Peter from Fringe, Damon from the Vampire Diaries, he's boring and a failure to be interesting or different. It's no surprise he turns Charlie down flat, sending her away despite them being family. When Nate sees her upset, he rushes up and threatens Miles, getting his arm caught by the barkeep who rips his shirt back to reveal a militia tattoo, signifying that Nate is a soldier of the Monroe Republic. Good for him. He runs away of course, bringing back a whole mess of soldiers to take Miles down.
In the most hilariously awful and overly choreographed and unlikely battle, Miles defeats a good fifteen of these sword, gun and arrow wielding men without suffering a single wound. If anything, the only good aspect of this sequence was the set, which obviously was once a lavish grand staircase that has crumbled to ruins and become overgrown. At one point it looks like Miles might get a sword up the wazoo when he's surrounded by four or five of these soldiers, but along comes Charlie who crossbows one and makes a run for it with her uncle.
Eventually, everyone's alright with not a single named character being lost in the shit scuffle. You could have introduced a character to die, you know. It's irritating when you do but it would have made it more interesting. Whatever though, because that turned out to be the finale, which is mightily disappointing. The one extra thing we learn before the end is that the friend that Miles drove to work with is Sebastian Monroe, the General of the Monroe Republic and presumably the bad guy.
In the side plot of the night, Danny breaks free from his captors when he discovers the bar he's handcuffed to is loose. He whams his guard with a quick and hard swipe that gives him time to escape, making his way towards a nearby house, only to suffer an asthma attack and die.
I wish, anyway. I barely know him but he comes across as the boring teenage rebel wuss who's going to fall in love with some chick that he's happy to die for at some point, and I'm going to absolutely despise him. God I hope I'm wrong.
He doesn't die. He actually wakes up in the bedroom of some African-American woman (too old to be the future object of his affection), who hands him her son's inhaler. We don't meet the son, and it looks like she lives alone. That is confirmed when the badass dude arrives looking for him, having seen the tracks leading to her back door. She lets them in and they recapture Danny thus thwarting the most pointless escape attempt ever.
In the actual final scene for Revolution's pilot, we see the black woman open a locked door and creep up into a tall tower where a computer lies in wait. She pulls something small out of her pocket, shown to be a device like the one Ben gave Aaron, which she activates, turning on the light bulb above her and powering the computer up. She then proceeds to communicate with a mystery stranger about the appearance of the militia, explaining that they didn't find 'it'.
Oooh... That was... intriguing. I did not come across a single character I enjoyed, though I don't mind Charlie, Aaron or doctor chick. I hope to see much more of Elizabeth Mitchell, though I doubt the show is going to revive her. It sounds strange but I hope they don't, I'll have more respect for it if they don't go back on their word just cause they have a good actress on their hands.
And yes, the story and inevitable revolution look like it’s going to be a lot of fun, but the show clearly needs to develop its own style and atmosphere before I'm going to take it seriously or really get into it. We'll see, but I felt particularly patronised by the stereotypes and shitty dialogue they threw at me, and I hope that the show can improve as it gets deeper and deeper into its mythology and its story.
