STAR TREK: DISCOVERY Searches For Hope in the Future

 Article first published as TV Review: STAR TREK: DISCOVERY SEASON 3 on Seat42F.

WARNING: This review contains spoilers from the Season 3 premiere.

STAR TREK: DISCOVERY returned today on CBS All Access for a third round. Picking up right where the previous season ended, Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) has successfully traveled 930 years into the future in her Red Angel suit. Unfortunately, the U.S.S. Discovery is not right behind her as she thought it would be. Now, she must travel an almost unrecognizable galaxy to find them again.

The episode, entitled “That Hope Is You, Part 1,” is essentially a two-person story. As Michael emerges from the wormhole, she smacks into a small spaceship owned by a man named Book (David Ajala, Supergirl), and they both crash on the planet below. Book is on a mission, which Michael has disrupted and does not figure into. She tries to endear herself to him so that he may help her, while he focuses on what he needs to get done. The story is of them coming to learn about and trust one another.

A lot of this STAR TREK: DISCOVERY premiere feels like Star Wars to me, and that’s not such a good thing. There are broad, alien landscapes (beautiful as they may be), strange creatures, lots of aliens, a vast, futuristic station that we only glimpse a small part of, and an extended chase-and-shoot season in which the bad guys can’t manage to seriously hit our heroes no matter how close they are and how many times they fire. Book is a trader who deals with shady people and seems pretty selfish himself. It’s much more action than most Trek, and appears to be lack the depth one expects from the scifi franchise.

But bit by bit, the Trek elements creep in. The aliens running things are Orions and Andorians, and we see Tellarites and Lurians in the background. These are familiar touch-points in a sea of less familiar races. We also begin to hear things about this future, mainly that a huge, catastrophic event called The Burn wiped out much of Starfleet and the Federation has largely disappeared. So we can start to see why the galaxy looks the way it does. Then, of course, there’s the big Book twist where we learn that he’s basically Newt Scarmander, and things immediately lighten up.

The pinnacle of the episode is when Michael and Book go to a Starfleet base where they meet Aditya Sahil (Adil Hussain, Life of Pi), a man glimpsed briefly at the start of the episode, who runs the empty station on behalf of Starfleet, but has never been commissioned an officer in the service. This man believes as deeply in the mission of the United Federation of Planets as Michael does, and he is the kindred beacon in the darkness. Never mind the lingering question as to why he has been left alone by the less savory aliens that are nearby. This scene is when the episode finally reveals itself to be fully Trek and gives viewers hope for the rest of the season.

There’s a lot about the STAR TREK: DISCOVERY premiere I didn’t like. The things I mention above, along with the total absence of the rest of the Discovery crew, whom I miss and desperately want to see again. Michael is not my favorite character on the show, and as soon as I realized this hour would be all about her, I groaned. Though, I admit, this was a solid episode for her and Martin-Green gave a great performance.

Yet, the genuine excitement sparked at the end almost made the whole thing worth it. There’s a cool mystery here, and a new mission. STAR TREK: DISCOVERY was a prequel to other Star Trek, and now with a goal of rebuilding the broken Federation, it’s almost a prequel set in the future as to how Starfleet came to be. This is a cool twist, maintaining a key element the show had before the jump, and I can’t wait to see how the rest of the season plays out. As long as the rest of the crew gets here soon.

STAR TREK: DISCOVERY releases new episodes every Thursday, only on CBS All Access.

Failing WATER

Article first published as FALLING WATER Review on Seat42F.

Following the critically acclaimed, ratings-challenged Mr. Robot, USA seeks to copy that, um, I guess you could call it success, with the new, trippy FALLING WATER. (That was not a knock on Mr. Robot, which I love, but a musing as to why a network wants to replicate a show that almost no one is watching.) Like Mr. Robot, FALLING WATER is high-concept drama that blurs the lines of reality and attempts to build a mysterious mythology that will spark much debate and predictions. But it is definitely a whole different show in a lot of ways.

As episode one begins, we meet three separate protagonists, each with their own pain. Tess (Lizzie Brochere, Versailles, American Horror Story: Asylum) is a trend-spotter who believes she may have had a child, though most people think she’s crazy. Burton (David Ajala, Black Box, The Dark Knight) is a fixer who has lost the woman he loves (Anna Wood, Reckless). Taka (Will Yun Lee, Hawaii Five-0) is a cop whose mother (Jodi Long, Sullivan & Son) is in a coma.

The connections between this trio are not immediately apparent, but it isn’t long before it’s explained to us. They are having very vivid dreams, or rather, pieces of the same dream, and if their experiences are combined, they could herald a very real danger.

To this end, the cast includes Bill Boerg (Zak Orth, Revolution, Wet Hot American Summer) and Woody Hammond (Kai Lennox, Legit, Beginners). Woody is bad news, jumping between dreams, and definitely seems like he can’t be trusted. Bill may be no less noble, a tech guy clearly wanting to profit based on his dream research, but at least he’s offering to help Tess in exchange for her assistance. So these are our shady peeps who pull the threads together.

Unfortunately, they don’t pull them together all that well. I’m not complaining about either character, or any of the cast; they all do a pretty good job, it seems to me, at least in episode one. Instead, my problem is that the series is boring, confusing, and I have no confidence that it is going anywhere neat. Granted, I’ve only viewed one episode, and plenty of great shows have poor pilots. It would just take a lot to come back from this one.

I give the series credit for not going procedural. I mean, they have a cop as one of the main characters, so I expected them to do so, but the plot seems completely serial instead. But it’s more a lack of cohesiveness and engagement that hurts it. We don’t get to know any of the characters very well before we’re distracted by all the dream stuff. And the dream stuff isn’t obvious, with viewers sometimes left wondering if what they’re seeing is reality or not.

Don’t get me wrong, on paper this sounds like a show I’d be totally into. I dig a cool premise that tells a new tale. Sure, it has similarities to Mr. Robot and Netflix’s Sense8, but FALLING WATER is far from a copy of either. Tess’s career of being the reclusive woman who sees patterns before anyone else makes sense for someone who sees the world a little more than the rest of us, and I can even extend a similar trait to the cop, as even though I’m burnt out on cop shows, it makes sense to use one here.

However, the execution leaves much to be desired, seeming more messy than anything, and not well thought or mapped out. I don’t know where things are going, and because of the haphazard way elements are introduced, I’m not sure the writers do either. More importantly, I don’t care to find out because I’m not drawn to any of the characters, who all seem like they could be bad people. (They could also be good people, it’s just not clear.) Even the title isn’t explained.

That’s just too much confusion for a series that doesn’t seem, on its face, worth the effort. There has to be some hook to bring people back, and there’s not in this one.

FALLING WATER premieres Thursday at 10/9c on USA.

Open Up the BLACK BOX

Article first written for Seat42F.

ABC’s new drama, BLACK BOX, is an interesting concept. A successful professional with bi-polar disorder and a tendency to go off her meds deals with life, love, and work, all while trying to hide and control her secrets. There is a recent trend on television to build a series around an eccentric genius, but at least in the “Pilot” of this one, more time is given to examining the lead’s personality than in others in the vein. That makes it feel fresh.

Kelly Reilly (Sherlock Holmes) plays Dr. Catherine Black, the main character. Black isn’t necessarily likeable, but she is a complex, fleshed out character. She’s a bit like FOX’s House in her abrasiveness and unreliability, though in her case, the problem is staying on the drugs, not off them. She also hallucinates, like the lead in TNT’s Perception, but BLACK BOX is what Perception should be, making the story more about Catherine than some case. Too bad the play on her name in the title is lower brow than the rest of the package.

Much of the first hour is spent raising the question of if Catherine should be medicated. Catherine points to the work of brilliant minds in history who accomplished great things when allowed to be who they are, wondering if taking the pills is holding her back in her own work. But her head doc, Dr. Hartramph (Vanessa Redgrave, Lee Daniels’ The Butler), points out that those heroes of Catherine’s all died young and Catherine could accomplish more, if a little more slowly, if she takes measures to stay alive.

BLACK BOX has a point of view. The writers are clearly in favor of treating this disorder. But they do a good job of making the audience understand Catherine’s reasoning, and for a bit, maybe even believe it. Yes, Catherine au naturel is destructive, but if she can hang on for a little longer, she might accomplish something great. It’s a revealing view of mental disease.

The “Pilot” provides a convenient door into this world in Will (David Ajala, The Dark Knight). Boyfriend to Catherine for the past year, Will only finds out about her struggle in this first episode, after proposing. At first, he’s mad that she kept this from him and understandably freaked out. But then he finds a side of this that he likes, which is a little creepy, but also something sympathetic.

When one begins to think Catherine can handle herself, one need only look at the relationship between her and Will to see how broken she is. Catherine doesn’t want to get married. She doesn’t think she deserves love or that Will should have to put up with her. She doesn’t want kids because of the risk of passing on her condition. But she also doesn’t want to run Will off, and she’s attracted to the dangerous part of him that encourages her to be wild. It’s not a healthy situation.

In addition to Will, we meet Catherine’s supportive brother, Joshua (David Chisum, One Life to Live), his uptight wife, Regan (Laura Fraser, Breaking Bad), and their sweet daughter, Esme (Siobhan Williams, Hell on Wheels), with whom Catherine is close. They are a link to normalcy and people she can rely on when she needs help. Thank goodness Catherine has Will and Esme, especially, giving her a connection to pull her back when she blasts off into space. Plus, there’s a great twist involving the family late in the hour.

Catherine’s co-workers are a less helpful bunch, though that could be because they don’t know what’s wrong with Catherine. Her boss, Dr. Morely (Terry Kinney, Oz), trusts her unconventional methods, meaning he doesn’t try to reign her in. New surgeon Dr. Bickman (Ditch Davey, Spartacus: War of the Damned) is practically a sexual predator, not a good person to be around when one of Catherine’s symptoms is hypersexuality and she’s in a steady relationship. Dr. Lark (Ali Wong, Are You There, Chelsea?) might be her friend, though.

BLACK BOX does have a procedural element. Even in the “Pilot,” there’s a patient that Catherine helps, amid all of the chaos in her own life. But the fact that her own life is so messy, and that we get to see so much of it, will fool many viewers into thinking this is more character study than case-of-the-week. I hope that balance is maintained in future installments, and not just used in the set up.

As a whole, I like BLACK BOX. It’s interesting with a sort-of unique character, certainly smarter than most broadcast network dramas. It has some cool visuals, mainly when Catherine is tripping. It also raises some interesting questions that should make viewers think. Check it out.

BLACK BOX premieres Thursday at 10 p.m. ET on ABC.