Dr. Christian King (Emun Elliot) is another unlikely TV science geek who'd look more at home in a Gillette commercial, currently monitoring solar flare activity in a den of computers. While at work, his company's satellite "Prometheus II" apparently steals the fire of future-knowledge from the Gods, by downloading a stream of random images to King's video-wall. The inappropriately-named atheist believes that these fuzzy pictures predict the future when he notices one snap features a mobile phone displaying a time 18 hours hence. A faulty, damaged phone -- yes? No, it's a photo from the future, okay?
A little peculiarly, King asks for a police officer with "imagination" to come and take a look at his bizarre find. So, stern DI Rebecca Flint (Tamzin Outhwaite) finds herself in his lab and, after hearing his theory, suspects the quirky scientist is a sociopath playing a game. Flint's colleagues, irascible Scot DS Ben Holt (Mark Bonnar) and fresh-faced DC Callum Gada (Chike Okonkwo), are called in to assist her, and both likewise believe Dr. King has just faked the photos (that appear to show glimpses of a railway bridge catastrophe) and is taking perverse pleasure in seeing them try and make sense of clues to the whereabouts of a bomb he'll detonate. Of course, when Flint starts to investigate the photographic evidence and treat his theory seriously, she slowly comes to realize the images do indeed seem to predict a confluence of disastrous events.
The minor subplots follow the predestined victims/culprit of the unfolding tragedy, going about their lives blissfully unaware they're chess pieces being pushed into position by the hand of Fate. For the audience, we take dark glee in noticing how possessions featured in King's photos (a driver's license, a backpack and Frisbee, a Blackberry phone, etc.) turn up in these stories, and watch as Flint and her team try to comprehend the images, extrapolate events to come, and try to alter their outcome to save the day.
Paradox's concept works fine. It should do because it's just a tweaked version of Minority Report, and the possibilities are clear and obvious for plentiful stories. This episode did a solid job of setting everything up, and it actually became quite gripping in the second half when the team were racing around trying to second-guess events without arousing suspicion or coming across as insane -- although I have to wonder why they didn't just ask the businessman on the doomed train to pull the emergency stop button before the carriages reached the bridge.
The performances were okay, but nothing special. Outhwaite only has one character in her -- the sexy, authoritative, working class cop (see: Red Cap, The Fixer) -- but she copes well in that comfort zone. Elliot was more interesting than I was expecting as King, mainly because his character was written to behave suspiciously throughout, and while that tactic to elicit uncertainty didn't work (as there was never any doubt he was telling the truth), it nevertheless offered something a bit different in how the cops dealt with King. Of course, all that insecurity will disappear now King's photo album's been proven right, so I hope future episodes have something else up their sleeves or else he'll quickly become redundant. After all, he's just the guy with access to the satellite link, so it'll be interesting to see how they utilize him hereon in. Will he just sit back and watch Flint's team run around like headless chickens, offering the occasional insight into a cryptic photo, or will he be needed out in the field sometimes?
The guest cast all had less complexity than the average patient wheeled into Holby City, but this was perhaps because episode 1 had less time or need to dedicate to them. Now the exposition's been dealt with, the guest stars will hopefully get more dimensions than "sleep-deprived gas tanker driver" and "stressed executive", as otherwise they're just hapless stooges in a grizzly game of determinism. A Crimewatch reconstruction told in reverse, you might say.
Overall, Paradox offers nothing very new -- a more unique example of characters fighting the future is FlashForward, which admittedly has its own flaws to deal with -- but there's certainly promise in he show if it manages to unlock its 24-meets-Minority Report potential. Or it could just become a reverse-engineered series of crimes that a bunch of underwritten characters try to piece together. But on the evidence of this first part, it's worth sticking with for now.
24 November 2009
BBC1/BBC HD, 9pm
written by: Lizzie Mickery directed by: Simon Cellan Jones starring: Tamzin Outhwaite (DI Rebecca Flint), Emun Elliott (Dr Christian King), Mark Bonnar (DS Ben Holt), Chike Okonkwo (DC Callum Gada), Pooky Quesnel (DCI Sarah Bower), Lorcan Cranitch (Simon Manning), Abigail Davies (Amelia James), Neil Fitzmaurice (Lister Wells), Clare Kerrigan (Kirsty Harmsley), Kevin Doyle (Harry Phelps), Fiona Dolman (Lauren Phelps), Peter Wells (Patterson James) & Kate Miles (Clare)
