Red Widow surviving, not thriving

Article first published as Red Widow surviving, not thriving on TheTVKing.

ABC's newest "gripping" drama is Red Widow, which offered a two hour premiere this week of "Pilot" and "The Contact." In it,  Marta Walraven (Radha Mitchell, Silent Hill), the grown daughter in a crime family, asks her husband, Evan (Hell on Wheels' Anson Mount), to get her and their three children out of the family business. Evan promises to do so, after warning Marta that they will have to leave everything behind. But before that can happen, Evan is murdered and Marta is forced into being a criminal herself to pay off his debt.

There are multiple sides to this story that Marta is trapped in, pulled in several directions. Her father, Andrei Petrov (Rade Sebedzija, 24, Batman Begins), whom she loves, is heavily involved in illegal activities. Her brother, Irwin (Wil Traval, All Saints) not only worked with Evan, but is now in jail. These characters are presented as loving and sympathetic, as is Marta's sister, Kat (Jaime Ray Newman, Eastwick, Grimm), so we are supposed to root for them, right?

But there are also the bad guys that we don't trust. This includes Evan and Irwin's partner, Mike (Lee Tergesen, Oz, The Big C), whom Marta doesn't trust, and who happens to be married to Marta's best friend, Dina (Suleka Mathew, Hawthorne, Men in Trees). I do wonder how Marta can wrap her head around the fact that Dina loves a man she despises, and if this has caused conflict between them in the past. Or maybe Marta is just now seeing Mike in a different light, after suspecting him of being involved in Evan's death? It's not clear how this dynamic supposedly works prior to the events of the "Pilot."

And then there's Nicholae Schiller (Goran Visnjic, ER), the man that Irwin stole from, but Marta is being forced to work for in Evan's name. There is almost a bit of romantic tension between Marta and Nicholae, at least from his side, but he also radiates a level of danger. This is a Very Bad Man, we're quickly told and shown in an extraneous boxing scene.

I'm going to be honest, Red Widow, while having many good components and interesting performances, does not feel all that unique to me. With Revenge, Scandal, and other like dramas on the air, this one, while somewhat different, isn't stand out enough to earn its place. ABC is starting to reuse its concepts, and making more of the same is not what viewers want.

I find most startling the differences between Schiller and the Petrovs. Even though both operate on the wrong side of the law, they are painted in such different strokes. We know right away who we are supposed to root for and against. The complexity that the series would get on a cable network isn't present here, and that makes it a lot less enticing, and plot twists seem forced.

In "The Contact," Marta makes her first move in Schiller's service, turning Bob (Rodney Rowland, Veronica Mars), a broke, divorced man into her paid-off patsy. It's a challenging assignment, one meant to wake Marta up to the new world that she is living in, and testing her resolve and dedication, done in the name of protecting her family. Yet, it's also completely predictable, and the ending feels like a cop out.

Also, we see Marta being a mother to Boris (Jakob Salvati), who thinks its OK to bring a gun to school, Natalie (Erin Moriarty, The Watch), who somehow stayed in the dark about what her dad did, and Gabriel (Sterling Beaumon, Clue), who is trying to follow in his father's footsteps. It's like the developers of this show had to give Marta these stakes, whom we know will never have anything too bad happen to them, but will likely be used mostly as pawns. Toss in a charming nanny, er, guard named Luther (Luke Goss, Hellboy II), and there's almost an unnecessary family series here, fighting for space within the main story.

At the same time as Marta dips her toe into the dark side, she is also being pressured by a federal agent, James Ramos (Clifton Collins Jr., The Event), to cooperate with the government. It turns out, Evan intended to turn in Andrei, Irwin, and the rest in in exchange for his family entering witness protection. Marta is horrified at this "big twist," having trouble believing her husband would turn on their family. This only serves to illustrate just how naive Marta is.

The biggest problem with Red Widow is that Marta is not a compelling character. She's too much of a fictional creation, lacking authenticity. Everything happens around her in broad strokes, because she might not be able to understand or deal with the nuance. The story is lacking because she is lacking. And the show keeps throwing more stuff and more characters at us hoping to distract from how surface everything is, and how weak Marta is as a creation.

Red Widow might still be good; it's not unsalvageable. It just feels too safe for ABC, and lacks the drawing power a new show needs in the current, crowded environment of high-quality TV. The more we see that's better, the more obvious it is when an effort falters. Red Widow's first episodes are quite shaky.

Red Widow airs Sundays at 10 p.m. ET on ABC.