Premierewatch: 'Bionic Woman'
Well, folks, she's here. Bionic Woman! We have the technology. We can rebuild her. And we can also celebrate her re-introduction into the prime-time lineup with a little help from one Alanis Morissette. Alanis, take it away!
A young girl
Gets hit by a truck
She was a bartender
Now she's down on her luck
She's got a smart boyfriend
A surgeon so distraught
And when he saw her mangled flesh he said,
"Hmmm, here's a thought...
She could be bionic, don'tcha think?
She could be bionic, yeah, I really do think..."
And indeed, most of the episode seemed to take place in the raaaaaaaaiiiiin, in a world where scientists can create robot-human hybrids but absolutely no one has ever heard of an umbrella. Honestly, that was just silly.
What stood out this summer amongst the large crop of new shows failed to truly lift off in its premier episode, lumbering along with a huge amount of exposition and a titular character who spent the entire episode acting as if she were waiting at the DMV to have her license renewed. While other fall genre shows such as Chuck and Reaper knowingly embrace the ridiculousness of their premises (while also provided thrills and chills), Bionic Woman takes itself utterly and completely seriously. Makes sense, given that creators of this show hail from the ultra-serious re-imagining of Battlestar Galactica, a show in which people are sent out of the airlock if they so much as crack a smile.
Problem is, Bionic Woman simply can't pull off such Galactica gravitas. It doesn't have the acting talent, writing talent, or even a premise to support such heaviness. Battlestar features Edward James Freakin' Olmos trying to stave off the complete annihilation of the human race from robots once under human control. Bionic Woman features Michelle Ryan sullenly asking "Why me?" for an hour. The stakes just aren't the same.
Throw in clunky exposition to such sullenness and you had a pilot that had me looking at my watch every few minutes: not a good sign, people. The first fifteen minutes chugged through all the backstory the show felt was necessary: Jaime Sommers is dating a successful professor/surgeon, Will, and living with her surly sister, Becca, who inherited her elder sibling's sunny disposition. Jaime announces she's pregnant, since apparently it wouldn't be bad enough that she's merely injured in a car wreck and loses her legs, arm, eye, and ear, but had to lose a baby as well in order for us to truly sympathize with her. (Hint: that's a sign the show doesn't have much faith in their lead's charisma.)
Amidst all this, we learn that Jaime is actually Bionic Woman 2 (Electric Boogaloo), with the first model, Sarah Corvis, having gone a leetle whacky in her post-hybrid life. Corvis, played by Katee Sackoff of Battlestar fame, stood out in this episode head and shoulders above the rest. In her climatic scene with Sommers, she reveals that she's slowly replaced her "human" parts over the years in order to remove "weakness" from her body. Not quite sure where she's getting the parts, though, to be honest. Maybe Home Depot? After all, they keep telling me, "You can do it. We can help." Then again, I can't so much as build a birdcage, never mind a bionic leg. So I beg to differ with Home Depot's assertion. But that's another story for another day.
This scene zeroed in on what will most likely be a prevailing theme of the show: what right to those in Will's group have to manipulate and control the bodies of these women? Who owns their bodies and abilities? It's an interesting debate, one that reminds me of the constant Slayer/Watcher tension on Buffy The Vampire Slayer. Bionic, like Buffy, seems to take a feminist stance that the women in question are often singled out against their will by patriarchal forces to do the dirty work these men can't or won't do on their own. But Jaime: I served with Buffy Summers (well, I own all the DVDs, if that counts); I knew Buffy Summers (well, through hand-written fanfic, if that counts); Buffy Summers was a friend of mine (in my really awesome dreams). Jaime, you're no Buffy Summers.
Now, simply because this interesting point was treated ham-fistedly in the pilot is no reason to discard it from the show: in fact, it might be the only thing that keeps this show from sinking into a simple stunt-laden drama. The fact that everything in this happened in this episode happened TO her is dramatically interesting, but what will be interesting going forth is how she turns from a passive vessel into an active force. That's far more interesting to me than extended lessons about anthrocites, this show's version of the dreaded Star Wars midichlorians.
Furthermore, the show needs badly to infuse some of Sackoff's energy into Michelle Ryan's character. I've never seen East Enders, so I don't know Ryan's previous work, but Lord almighty, I've seen people in the middle of dental surgery having more fun than she was tonight. At one point, my wife turned to me and half-screamed, "Why didn't they give her a personality during the surgery?" I understand she shouldn't break into song upon learning that she's a walking laptop with super ninja skillz, but it's a bad sign when I cheer for the show's villain breaking the arm of my supposed hero. Just saying.
But hey, it's all good: there's plenty of good ideas on the show, even if they were clumsily executed on the first go-round. Jaime's journey from drink-slinging bartender to butt-kicking fembot should provide many excellent montages. The idea that Will's father will try and exact revenge on not only his son, but the entire organization, is interesting enough as a season-long plot. (Especially since Will's father, Anthony, is played by another Battlestar alum, Mark Sheppard, so amazingly good as Baltar's lawyer last season. And hey, Chief Tyrol played a prison guard! Yes, I miss Battlestar Galactica, dearly. The way the deserts miss the rain. Is it obvious?)
The seeds for a good show are there. It's just that in this first week, they haven't quite begun to sprout just yet.
What did you think of the premiere? Am I being too harsh or did you also feel something was lacking? And would a bionic leg help explain exactly why Beckham can bend it so effortlessly?
Much better than the original pilot, but still it doesn't seem deserving of it's buzz. A lot of the acting is terrible (Asian guy and shrink lady), and the lines could use some work. I personally don't stress too much about realism (that's the whole point of scripted TV), but this show is pushing it- Corvis snaps Sommers's hand, yet when she's thrown off the roof, she hangs on with both her hands. Also, I get that they have a lot of strength, but nothing a well aimed shot to the throat or the head won't cure... I certainly don't think their abilities are worth 50 mil.
I would rather the Jamie Sommers role went to Katee, she just seems more suited to it. I guess she was too busy with Gallactica or other commitments to do it. Overall a fun show, but I want to see where they are going to go with the story from here.
Liked the episode overall, but the pace was slow (ok, lumbering) at times. Thought the show's tone was unnecessarily dour and sober. Given that this character and the $6 Million Dollar Man are pop-culture icons, I think a lighter, more tongue in cheek (not camp) approach might work better. Main character is something of a downer, tough to warm up to.
Odd that the Sarah Corvus character is so compelling compared to the lead. Makes me wonder if the show wouldn't work better as a vehicle for Sarah/Katie. Think about it: A show about a rogue bionic woman; in essence a show about the villain. Now that would be a twist!
I agree that Jamie didn't show much personality in this episode - I think they tried to jam too much into one hour -> Jamie being in a car accident, nearly dying and losing her baby. Jamie becoming a bionic woman against her will and coping with what that means physically. The politics and conflicts that the organization who 'saved' her are involved in. The rogue bionic woman and the vendetta against the organization. It was way too much ground to cover in one hour. They could easily have dealt with just the first two issues, introducing the shadowy corporation at the very end to explore in the next episode.
I didn't find the episode slow at all, just so scattered that I couldn't get emotionally invested which made it *boring* and flat. I think fans of battlestar are already invested in Katee, which is why she was infinitely more compelling. Plus, she was given more motivation and personality than Jamie, perhaps because her character had already coped with being 'turned,' as it were.
I think that having Sarah return as a sort of... evil mentor character would be far more interesting than having the two bionic women simply appear as enemies. Jamie doesn't want to trust the organization, here's another woman who has already been through it... let them both try to win her over for a while....
Please Don't even put BUFFY in the same sentence as this garbage snooze Joss Whedon gave a near perfect show - this is clunky, second rate, over hyped crud.
Bring back Lindsay Wagner. And she won an Emmy for the role, too. No way that will happen with Ryan.
Yeah the Pilot got off to a slow start, but all in all I thought the show was very good. Anyone that watchs BSG know that most of the time that show is deliberate and not action packed, but tense, and brooding. I think Bionic woman will get there. The Evidence suggest it. Whenever Katee Sackoff was on screen Bionic woman hit its stride. Yes, it's no Buffy or BSG it has more poetential to be an Alias. I think it's going to be fun to hang around and watch this show find it's legs.
Much better then the original. I grew up watching Six Million Dollar Man, The Bionic Woman, Battlestar Galatica and The A team. Even as I child I knew back then that these shows were cartoonish, even back then I knew the writing was stiff and the actors stiffer. Bionic Woman needs to lighten up just a bit and I think it will be fine. It's getting a season p*** from me just for the simple reason that the show has a writer and producer that knows Scifi shows can be dramatic and the characters can be real instead of cartoons.
I thought the show was decent, though Michelle Ryan was much too sullen. There is the promise of a more spirited show now that she knows what her abilities are. I think the director tried to make Jamie "cool" when she needs to be feisty and spiritied - someone we can root for and care about.
I was pretty disappointed in this. NBC has been hyping it up for so long, and I thought of their 3 new sci-fi/action shows, this was by far the worst. I wish they had put as much effort into promoting Chuck or Journeyman as they did for this. And it's interesting that you bring up Buffy...what made that show so great (indeed, one of the top 2 or 3 shows of all time, imo) was how likable the characters were, and how they could take a premise so silly, and somehow manage to combine humor, romance, action, and drama into every hour and make it all believable. This show has no humor (and really, with its premise, it should), non-believable romance, and melodrama instead of drama. The only thing it had was action. Maybe it's the writers, maybe it's the actors (the Bionic Woman is no Sarah Michelle Gellar, that's for sure) or maybe it's a combination, but this is a show that I won't be watching again. Maybe it will get a lot better and I'll have to catch up with it on DVD, but I just don't see it happening.