Familiarity and Contempt

“This reminds me of something else” isn’t, in and of itself, a valid critique.  Of course, if a show is derivative or reminiscent of other shows it may leave viewers bored, or feeling they’ve seen it all before.  But the opposite may just as easily be true: hanging new ideas on a familiar framework may make those ideas shine all the more, and leave room for experimentation.  Reminding people of things they like can trigger happy associations and permit beneficial storytelling shortcuts.  This is one of the things that makes procedurals work so well:  the format of the procedural is so familiar that the writers can skip bits, leaving viewers familiar with the form to fill in the gaps, which means they can fit more story into less time.  Try watching a procedural from 25 years ago, and you may find yourself bored—because they have to lay down so much track before they can move the train forward.  Regular procedural watchers, nowadays, come with the track pre-laid.

I understand why reviewers are tempted to criticize shows as derivative.  I’m sure I myself have done it before, and no doubt I will do it again. But it’s not particularly rigorous, and it’s not something to be proud of.  It feels clever to recognize a show’s forbears, and putting the show down on that basis is as much self-congratulation as critique.  And for my part, it’s not a whole lot of fun to go through life feeling jaded.  I’d rather find the fun in the familiar and the fresh alike.   The truth is that derivativeness in itself isn’t bad.  What’s actually bad is derivativeness without interest.   Just as aping something boring will probably be boring, aping something interesting may create interesting results.  Likewise, if one apes something boring but adds interesting elements, the result might be quite interesting indeed.  To make an analogy:  the mere fact that humans usually come with a common skeletal configuration doesn’t make all humans ugly.  It all depends what they’re carrying on that skeleton. 

 

Almost Human (Fox, new.  Science fiction; law enforcement procedural.)

Watched:  First two episodes (two-night pilot)

Premise: In a dystopian future, a police officer and his emotion-enabled android partner fight crime.

Promise:  The struggle in reviewing this show is that it has considerable promise, but doesn’t really live up to it in its first episodes.  The premise is aptly introduced in the pilot, which paints a vivid picture of a dystopian future dominated by organized criminal elements.  Police officers are required by law to partner with AI androids, which presumably discourages corruption and improves efficiency, but creates inevitable stylistic contrasts.  The world  has a lot in common with Blade Runner, Minority Report, and other techno-dystopias that seem, for all their faults, disturbingly possible and even liveable.  In fact, it’s not just the setting that seems familiar, as the show as a whole is reminiscent of many science fiction and anime settings.  (Anime-wise, I especially found myself flashing to Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, but that’s only one of many.)  Indeed, there’s not a whole lot here that’s wholly original, but (unlike some other reviewers) I see that as a feature rather than a bug.  Since we can already guess what the world and its characters hold, we can dive right into its stories and idiosyncracies. 

But while the concept has a lot to offer, its execution is mixed.  The performances are good:  Karl Urban is especially nuanced as a cop who’s been physically repaired after a terrible injury, but remains psychologically broken in interesting ways.  The visuals are elaborate and strikingly well done.  But the execution breaks down in the scripts—the tone wobbles awkwardly between serious and self-important, on one hand, and banteringly light on the other.  On the whole, I prefer the latter tone, which many recent procedurals have done successfully without losing the gravity of their subjects.  The second episode was tonally better than the first, as the main characters began to develop a rapport—but its subject matter was annoying.  I’m not surprised that a show about androids and law enforcement would go to the sex-bot well, but to do so so early in the show’s run—even with the moderately original spin that this show put on it—seemed a bit like phoning it in.  But despite those flaws, which are significant, I have pretty high hopes for the show.  Given some time to breathe, and the growing rapport between the characters, I could see it blossoming into a nice, bantery, sci-fi procedural.

Verdict:  I really want it to work, but it hasn’t yet found its feet.  It remains to be seen whether it will do so.

On the DVR (or perhaps watched and/or deleted, but at least as-yet-unreviewed): Lucky 7 (canceled), Sean Saves the World, Witches of East End, Naked Vegas, Adam Devine’s House Party, Ground Floor, and The Paradise.  Plus, we get a couple of new HBO shows this weekend.