So, knowing this was a spin off I went back and watched Legion before watching the pilot of this series. I then lowered my expectations (going from film to TV is always going to be a little disappointing) and sat down to watch.
Oh my! There is a good idea in the basic premise of the show, but good lord did they do their best to kill it.
For starters, it's been just twenty years or so since the destruction of civilisation at the hands of angels. Humans are clustered into small enclaves for survival. Angels are everywhere and they hate us. And so on and so forth...
So why, in such a short time span, did the humans feel it necessary to rename Las Vegas to just Vega? Do their scavenging parties get lost when they go outside the walls? I can imagine someone looking at a map (which they probably still use to navigate) and going "Hmmm. Can't find Vega on the map, just this Las Vegas place. How do we get home?" It's just ridiculous.
Equally ridiculous (and laugh-worthy) are the angels themselves. Having decided to "Kill All Humans!", they seem, for the most part, to have been turned into drooling, demonic caricatures of themselves. There is little frightening about watching such a black-eyed, soulless demon murdering innocents on TV. How about if they'd actually retained the angels more traditional image of a shining paragon of good, radiating power? Wouldn't that have had more impact than some frothing, drooling thing? Okay, back to the twenty years have passed thing...
The survivors seem, in this limited time frame, to have reverted to a form of upper and lower caste system mish-mashed together with a healthy dose of ancient Rome. It's a pitiful attempt at showing a dystopian society that just makes you shake your head all the time they spam it in your face.
And just who was it that decided that all such societies have to have manipulating, power-hungry people in them that serve their own ends rather than the people they supposedly protect? It just shrieks of lazy writing. Save me from writers that think political intrigue is required in every show. Just cause Game of Thrones has it doesn't mean you need it in everything.
So, the pilot plods along pedestrianly for the most part, introducing us to the cast and the setting but doing little to keep your interest. The characters are uniformly bland and uninteresting and it is difficult to like any of them, except maybe for the "Newt" analogue.
Towards the end, our hero receives the gift of magic tattoos that will reveal to him how to save humanity from the evil angel scourge. Except, going on the strength of the first bit that he deciphers I suspect the tattoos are going to be a Macguffin designed to further the plot whenever needed by telling the hero where to go and what to do. Either that or he's just gotten himself a full body Magic Eight Ball to dispense pearls of needless wisdom such as the "Beware those closest to you" as happened at the end here. Sheesh!
I had hopes for this show after re-watching Legion, but this is just dire. It's going to bog down in political machination and not go anywhere fast. It will be interminable. Expect nothing much to happen all season. If I were writing it there'd at least be a season's end payoff - maybe a Pompeii-like destruction of Vega and the survivors left having to fend for themselves in the "outdoors" in the last episode. Something worth watching all the dreary in-between episodes that we are sure to get. But I doubt that will happen.
EDIT: So I forced myself to watch episodes two and three. Briefly, we are allowed to leave the drearily-envisioned Vega, but only so that the hero can be forced to return there. Oh God! It's so tedious and obvious! Three episodes, I'm afraid, is my limit, which makes it even less watchable than Helix, in my book.
SUMMARY: Tries hard not to be a formula show, but fails very quickly. A nice idea, maybe, but hampered by dire-logue and stupidity, it is sure to have a short run.
Oh my! There is a good idea in the basic premise of the show, but good lord did they do their best to kill it.
For starters, it's been just twenty years or so since the destruction of civilisation at the hands of angels. Humans are clustered into small enclaves for survival. Angels are everywhere and they hate us. And so on and so forth...
So why, in such a short time span, did the humans feel it necessary to rename Las Vegas to just Vega? Do their scavenging parties get lost when they go outside the walls? I can imagine someone looking at a map (which they probably still use to navigate) and going "Hmmm. Can't find Vega on the map, just this Las Vegas place. How do we get home?" It's just ridiculous.
Equally ridiculous (and laugh-worthy) are the angels themselves. Having decided to "Kill All Humans!", they seem, for the most part, to have been turned into drooling, demonic caricatures of themselves. There is little frightening about watching such a black-eyed, soulless demon murdering innocents on TV. How about if they'd actually retained the angels more traditional image of a shining paragon of good, radiating power? Wouldn't that have had more impact than some frothing, drooling thing? Okay, back to the twenty years have passed thing...
The survivors seem, in this limited time frame, to have reverted to a form of upper and lower caste system mish-mashed together with a healthy dose of ancient Rome. It's a pitiful attempt at showing a dystopian society that just makes you shake your head all the time they spam it in your face.
And just who was it that decided that all such societies have to have manipulating, power-hungry people in them that serve their own ends rather than the people they supposedly protect? It just shrieks of lazy writing. Save me from writers that think political intrigue is required in every show. Just cause Game of Thrones has it doesn't mean you need it in everything.
So, the pilot plods along pedestrianly for the most part, introducing us to the cast and the setting but doing little to keep your interest. The characters are uniformly bland and uninteresting and it is difficult to like any of them, except maybe for the "Newt" analogue.
Towards the end, our hero receives the gift of magic tattoos that will reveal to him how to save humanity from the evil angel scourge. Except, going on the strength of the first bit that he deciphers I suspect the tattoos are going to be a Macguffin designed to further the plot whenever needed by telling the hero where to go and what to do. Either that or he's just gotten himself a full body Magic Eight Ball to dispense pearls of needless wisdom such as the "Beware those closest to you" as happened at the end here. Sheesh!
I had hopes for this show after re-watching Legion, but this is just dire. It's going to bog down in political machination and not go anywhere fast. It will be interminable. Expect nothing much to happen all season. If I were writing it there'd at least be a season's end payoff - maybe a Pompeii-like destruction of Vega and the survivors left having to fend for themselves in the "outdoors" in the last episode. Something worth watching all the dreary in-between episodes that we are sure to get. But I doubt that will happen.
EDIT: So I forced myself to watch episodes two and three. Briefly, we are allowed to leave the drearily-envisioned Vega, but only so that the hero can be forced to return there. Oh God! It's so tedious and obvious! Three episodes, I'm afraid, is my limit, which makes it even less watchable than Helix, in my book.
SUMMARY: Tries hard not to be a formula show, but fails very quickly. A nice idea, maybe, but hampered by dire-logue and stupidity, it is sure to have a short run.