ALCATRAZ, 1.3 – "Kit Nelson"

My feelings about Alcatraz haven't shifted after its third episode. It's doing a poor job making its primary characters appear interesting, simply because it spends almost no time focusing on them. Instead, the majority of every episode, so far, has been spent exploring the week's escapee—in this case child killer Kit Nelson (Michael Eklund)—and that's a puzzling decision to have made. A few scraps about Soto's (Jorge Garcia) past were alluded to near the end (he was kidnapped aged 11), and it seems more obvious than ever that Hauser's (Sam Neill) keeping the whole truth about the disappearance of the "Sixty-Threes" from his new teammates, but 95% of the episode is still spent fleshing out a glorified guest-star.

Fortunately, the character of Kit Nelson and his storyline was provocative and entertaining, on the level of a chilling tale about a man who murdered his younger brother, derived pleasure from that act, and went on to kill other children as an adult. Eklund (cast because of his brilliant performance in Fringe's "The Plateau"?) was both horrifying and sympathetic here, and I enjoyed all of his scenes simply because he was in them. The way the show flashbacks to a pre-'63 Alcatraz is also working quite well, even if everything happening in the '50s or '60s feels as realistic as a Sin City vignette at times. It's also becoming clearer that Alcatraz is to Fringe what Millennium was to X Files; a show operating in the same ballpark, but more interested in dealing with human monsters than issues of time-travel and whatnot. You can imagine a cameo from Walter Bishop, as the two shows feel like they exist in the same universe.

I wouldn't say Alcatraz is a big failure just yet, because I'm enjoying it more than most other sci-fi shows after three hours (i.e. FlashForward and The Event.) It's just difficult to see this show maintaining any appeal by the time we've caught the tenth, twentieth or thirtieth bad guy and thrown them back in the slammer... with potentially another 272 left to catch! (And how long are previous guest-stars expected to stick around to be filmed mooching around their new cells? Or have all the actors filmed numerous scenes that the creators can simply paste into future episodes?)

Overall, this was an entertaining and atmospheric episode, for the most part, but I think we need to get under the skin of Madsen (Sarah Jones), Hauser and Soto before they disappear into the background entirely. And it would also be nice if they could explain why every prisoner arrives in the present-day with negligible culture shock (having jumped 49 years into their future), with the odd compulsion to continue their crimes! Wouldn't most people, except maybe the true psychopaths, simply lie low and try to disappear into the fabric of modern society? Why are they all keen to continue their signature crimes that saw them thrown into jail to begin with? I know it's hard to have a show if they don't do that, but it's still a strange flaw in the show's logic they should perhaps try to answer.

Three hours in, what is everyone else making of Alcatraz? Is the procedural nature of the show too much of a turn-off, or are you enjoying watching stories that resolve every hour? Are the main characters appealing to you, or do you agree they currently exist to chase the more interesting weekly villains?

written by Jennifer Johnson / directed by Jack Bender / 23 January 2012 / Fox

Review: ALCATRAZ, 1.1 & 1.2 - "Pilot" & "Ernest Cobb"

"Pilot"

"Ernest Cobb"

The latest sci-fi drama from the company behind Lost and Fringe is almost an amalgam of those shows, crossed with the defunct Prison Break and a tincture of Whitechapel. On 21 March 1963, San Francisco's notorious offshore prison Alcatraz was closed and all remaining prisoners transferred off the island, but this series claims that was just a cover-story. In actual fact, everyone vanished in mysterious circumstances one night, and 49 years later those missing convicts have started to reappear and continue their crimes. It's up to plucky SFPD homicide detective Rebecca Madsen (Sarah Jones, the pocket-sized Anna Torv) to recapture them on behalf of enigmatic FBI Agent Emerson Hauser (Sam Neill), with the help of comic-book writer and The Rock historian Dr Diego "Doc" Sato (Jorge Garcia), while trying to explain how and why these prisoners have travelled through time.

Stylistically, Alcatraz is as sophisticated and glossy as you'd expect from the team behind the luscious Lost and accomplished Fringe. You can't underestimate the soothing effect of knowing you're in safe hands when it comes to the technical demands of putting a show like this together, and if nothing else Alcatraz doesn't disappoint on a purely aesthetic level (even when, subsequent to its pilot, no filming actually takes place on the real-life Alcatraz). But that familiarity breeds a certain level of problems, because there are chunks of this show that evoke either Fringe or Lost—and not just in terms of production, like the return of composer Michael Giacchino to handle the music, Lost stalwart Jack Bender directing, or Lost's "whooshing" flashbacks being replaced by the "clanking" screen wipe of prison bars. In many ways this is just freshman-era Fringe with mad prisoners replacing mad scientists, chased by another triptych of archetypal characters: the gutsy blonde, the intelligent nerd, and the mysterious older man. Sure there are differences, but there's a pervasive feeling that co-creator Elizabeth Sarnoff (a staff writer for Lost) has taken ingredients she liked from JJ Abrams' other hits and only tried to disguise that fact halfheartedly.

Even the narrative device of flashbacks recalls Lost, as each week's story jumps back to Alcatraz's heyday to provide back-story for the criminals, so we can better understand their motivations and plans. Still, fair's fair, because that's a good format to use for this show, and Alcatraz feels better suited to standalone episodes than Fringe ever did. I just wonder how long the show can take its fugitive-of-the-week procedural formula, with each con eventually being returned to a modern version of Alcatraz secretly built below the original, to continue their sentences. There is a serialized element (namely the central mystery of what happened to the "Sixty-Threes" to deposit them five decades into the future), but how long can Alcatraz string that out for? Unlike Fringe, it's harder to see how this show can be opened up in future seasons, and that's a big concern for anyone wondering if it's worth investing time and energy into Alcatraz. I'm not sure how many episodes I can watch of something that's fundamentally a standard cop show with vague sci-fi underpinning the unseen "prison break", unless that formula proves to be incredibly rewarding in some vital way.

The pilot is surprisingly poor, which I really wasn't expecting to be true. There isn't too much to explain to viewers, but the episodes makes the mistake of spending far too much time on our first criminal—murderer Jack Sylvane (Jeffrey Pierce)—rather than get us interested in the show's regulars. After the first hour, I had alost no real feelings or positive opinions of Madsen, Hauser and Soto, and could barely even remember their names. Things don't improve that much for the second episode, "Ernest Cobb", although that story was much more enjoyable because the eponymous con's back-story and modus operandi was simply more entertaining than Sylvane's. There was also a decent ending which intrigued me enough to be considered a success.

Essentially, Alcatraz's first few episodes laid out its premise and planted a few seeds that could grow into something interesting, plus it looks and sounds great as a piece of television, but the stories did a bad job of getting us interested in either of the three main actors, and I'm very wary of SF shows that intend to be mostly episodic. That was exactly the thinking behind Fringe when it first began, until the writers realised that the key audience were responding more to the mytharc than the freak-of-the-week cases. Can Alcatraz course correct in a similar way, given its more rigid concept? Maybe, but it won't be as easy. Will audiences stick with it through these self-contained stories, if only to catch the occasional clue about the bigger mystery? Is it even possible that the big mystery won't be fairly predictable, like a company using Alcatraz's inmates in secret government trials into time-travel? It's always very hard to outwit fans of this genre, especially in this day and age when fan theories spread like wildfire online... and, as we saw with Lost, sometimes eclipse what the creators had in store for us.

Overall, "Ernest Cobb" was entertaining enough to draw me back, even if I can't shake my doubts about this show's overall chances of success. It helps that it's a mid-season replacement, so there aren't too many episodes ordered and less chance for audiences to get bored, and there's obviously time for the writers to make us care about the investigators. But this is the second weakest pilot of a JJ Abrams-affiliated show, behind Undercovers, and I was expecting something far more compelling and exciting.

written by Steven Lilien, Bryan Wynbrandt & Elizabeth Sarnoff (1.1) & Alison Balian (1.2) / directed by Danny Cannon (1.1) & Jack Bender (1.2) / 16 January 2012 / Fox

Dan's Most Anticipated TV Shows of early-2012

Who cares about what was good or disappointing about television in 2011? That's all in the past now, so let's move on. 2012! A shiny new year, full of old favourites and exciting newcomers. Below I pick my 11 Most Anticipated TV Shows of the new year period (Jan/Feb), so be sure to keep an eye out for the following on your screens:

11. Mad Dogs

(Sky1, 19 Jan) I'm in two minds about this show's return. I really loved half of series 1's four episodes, but felt the story tailed off sharply and didn't end well. Even worse, I didn't expect and still don't understand why Mad Dogs is coming back, because the story didn't seem to demand it. So I'm intrigued to see what they have planned in this second year, and if some lessons will have been learned from before. If nothing else, the great cast (John Simm, Philip Glenister, Marc Warren, Max Beesley) should be worth watching as the four childhood friends having a terrible time in paradise.

10. Smash

(NBC, 6 Feb) As Glee gets more ridiculous and repetitive, drowning in its own self-righteous silliness and celebrity cameos, will this brand new musical drama steal some of its thunder? I doubt it, because Smash is a very different beast, but maybe there are some disillusioned Glee fans who are craving something more substantial and dramatic. This song-and-dance drama, about the making of a Broadway show based on Marilyn Monroe's life, should be worth a few hours of your precious time.

9. Eternal Law

(ITV1, 5 Jan) A brand new fantasy drama from the writers behind Life On Mars and Ashes To Ashes, which is reason enough to be excited. (Unfortunately they also did renowned flop Bonekickers, so there are no guarantees.) Eternal Law concerns two heavenly angels, Zak and Tom, who are working as lawyers in modern-day York and use their abilities to influence the community around them in a positive way. Will this be a mawkish Highway To Heaven-style courtroom drama? I have no idea, but it should be worth finding out.

8. Luck

(HBO, 29 Jan) A drama written by David Milch (Deadwood), with a pilot directed by Michael Mann (Heat), starring Dustin Hoffman in his first TV role. Those facts alone guarantee many people will be tuning into this horse racing drama, but it remains to be seen if this equine underworld and its granite-faced characters will charm viewers into going the distance. But can you really refuse anything that co-stars Nick Nolte, Ian Hart, Dennis Farina and Michael Gambon?

7. Justified

(FX, 17 Jan) The third season of Justified will hopefully build on the brilliant second, now the writers have found a great balance between telling standalone stories while keeping an eye on an larger story arc. Great performances from Timothy Olyphant and Walton Goggins, who are joined this year by the beautiful Carla Gugino as a U.S Marshall Assistant Director (an actress who's no stranger to the work of author Elmore Leonard, having starred in Karen Sisco).

6. Being Human

(BBC Three, TBA) This will be a difficult series of the supernatural drama, given the departure of Aidan Turner (as tortured vampire Mitchell) and the knowledge that Russell Tovey's werewolf George is also leaving. Creator Toby Whithouse has his work cutout introducing a more urbane vampire to the group dynamic (played by Irishman Damien Moloney), and it remains to be seen if fans will accept the coming changes. Might it be best to end the show and let fans embrace the fluffier US remake? Maybe, but I'm very interested to see if Being Human can keep its audience as 66% of the original cast leave for pastures new.

5. Touch

(Fox, 25 Jan) It's Kiefer Sutherland's return to TV after 24, in a brand new sci-fi mystery series from the creator of Heroes. The setup is very simple: Sutherland plays the father of an autistic/mute boy who is able to predict various disasters, which he then has to prevent. It doesn't sound very original, but you can't deny the potential for some exciting case-of-the-week stories as father and son save the day together. The test here will be finding ways to stop the formula becoming too irritating. At least it's only been given a half-season order, so it stands a better chance of not outstaying its welcome.

4. The River

(ABC, 7 Feb) Horror is the big thing on television right now, following the success of True Blood and American Horror Story (we'll forget the unjust failure of the brilliant Harper's Island). What makes The River so anticipated is its unique-for-television format: a documentary-style affair similar to The Blair Witch Project, about the search for a famous explorer who goes missing in the Amazon. Six months later, the man's family go on a search to uncover what happened to him, joined by a documentary filmmaker, and discover supernatural goings-on. From the director of Paranormal Activity and a writer of Millennium, The River has the potential to be something really gripping.

3. Alcatraz

(Fox , 16 Jan) The latest project from JJ Abrams' Bad Robot production company, Alcatraz could go either way. The concept sounds great for a movie (prisoners from "The Rock" all go missing one night in the past, only to reappear in the modern-day), but can a TV series sustain that idea and keep audiences interested? It's hard to see how the writers will keep this rolling for years (can't they just interrogate their first recaptured fugitive for answers?), but I'm willing to give anything with Abrams' name attached the benefit of the doubt. Even if he's not actually very hands-on with these shows, day to day.

2. Spartacus: Vengeance

(Starz, 27 Jan) The first true sequel to Spartacus: Blood & Sand, after last year's brilliant prequel, Vengeance sees the show painting on a much bigger canvas. The budget is bigger, meaning the show can take the gladiators beyond the confines of the Capua arena and their training camp, out into the wider world. The big uncertainty is if Liam McIntyre will prove to be a fitting replacement for the late Andy Whitfield in the title role, but I see no reason to be concerned from the trailers. He looks very similar (which helps) and appears to have the same kind of charisma. Expect more ultra-violence, sex, politics, tragedy, nudity, double-crosses, gore, swearing, death and mutilation. I can't think of many shows that are so relentlessly fun and entertaining.

1. Sherlock

(BBC One, 1 Jan) The long-awaited return of the BBC's Sherlock Holmes update, with Benedict Cumberbatch back as the world's greatest sleuth and Martin Freeman as amiable colleague Dr Watson. It's been 18-months since series 1's cliffhanger, and what's exciting about series 2 is that co-creators Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss have chosen to adapt Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's most famous stories: the one with Irene Adler ("A Scandal In Bohemia"), the one with a beast prowling the moors ("The Hound Of The Baskervilles"), and the one where Sherlock confronts his arch-nemesis Moriarty ("The Final Problem"). With three of the best stories to hand, if Sherlock maintains its sense of visual style, wit and inventiveness, I think we already have a very early contender for Best TV Show of 2012...

Watch buy ALCATRAZ and GRIMM

I didn't expect this! Fox's mid-season sci-fi drama Alcatraz has been bought by Watch for broadcast in the UK. Considering it's one of the most anticipated TV shows for genre fans, I was expecting Sky to swoop in and buy it (especially considering their links to Fox). Maybe they thought Terra Nova was a safer bet and spent their money there? The fools.

Alcatraz is the latest big-budget sci-fi drama from producer JJ Abrams (Lost, Fringe), about the reappearance of dangerous prisoners who mysteriously disappeared from Alcatraz decades earlier. It premieres this January in the US.

Watch have also acquired the UK rights to fantasy cop show Grimm, about a detective with the ability to see "fairy tale" creatures that live secretly amongst humans. It's already airing in the US on NBC.

However, as Watch is more of a premium digital channel, this means less Brits will get to see Alcatraz and Grimm next year. So while it's great to see that Sky's money doesn't always guarantee first dibs on every big US show, in some ways its a shame when these smaller channels buy big American shows because far fewer people will ever see them.

On a positive note, Watch had the UK rights to superhero drama No Ordinary Family last year, and that show pulled in impressive ratings for them most weeks, so maybe British audiences are now aware Watch has US shows they might want to see.

Luckily I have Watch as part of my Virgin Media XL package, so I'll be tuning in for Alcatraz. I wish I could say the same about Grimm, but I saw its pilot... and no matter how much it improves, it will always star the charisma-vacuum David Giuntoli.

Fox Previews: 'Alcatraz', 'Terra Nova' & 'Touch'

Fox had their Upfronts yesterday, revealing their new shows for 2011/12 to the press and marketing people. Of particular interest to me are their three sci-fi dramas: JJ Abrams' latest mystery Alcatraz, Steven Spielberg-produced dinosaur adventure Terra Nova, and Heroes creator Tim Kring's supernatural drama Touch with Kiefer Sutherland. The official synopses and a few previews can be seen below:

ALCATRAZ

From executive producer J.J. Abrams (FRINGE, "Lost," "Star Trek" and the upcoming "Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol" and "Super 8") and writer and executive producer Elizabeth Sarnoff ("Lost," "Deadwood") comes ALCATRAZ, the chilling new thriller centered on America's most infamous prison and one-time home to the nation's most notorious murderers, rapists, kidnappers, thieves and arsonists. When San Francisco Police Department DET. REBECCA MADSEN (Sarah Jones, "Sons of Anarchy") is assigned to a grisly homicide case, a fingerprint leads her to a shocking suspect: JACK SYLVANE (guest star Jeffrey Pierce, "The Nine"), a former Alcatraz inmate who died decades ago. Given her family history – both her grandfather and surrogate uncle, RAY ARCHER (Robert Forster, "Jackie Brown"), were guards at the prison – Madsen's interest is immediately piqued, and once the enigmatic, knows-everything-but-tells-nothing government agent EMERSON HAUSER (Sam Neill, "Jurassic Park") tries to impede her investigation, she's doggedly committed. Madsen turns to Alcatraz expert and comic book enthusiast, DR. DIEGO "DOC" SOTO (Jorge Garcia, "Lost"), to piece together the inexplicable sequence of events. The twosome discovers that Sylvane is not only alive, but he's loose on the streets of San Francisco, leaving bodies in his wake. And strangely, he hasn't aged a day since he was in Alcatraz, when the prison was ruled by the iron-fisted WARDEN EDWIN JAMES (Jonny Coyne, "Undercovers") and the merciless ASSOCIATE WARDEN E.B. TILLER (Jason Butler Harner, "The Changeling"). Madsen and Soto reluctantly team with Agent Hauser and his technician, LUCY BANERJEE (Parminder Nagra, "ER"), to stop Sylvane's vengeful killing spree. By delving into Alcatraz history, government cover-ups and Rebecca's own heritage, the team will ultimately discover that Sylvane is only a small part of a much larger, more sinister present-day threat. For while he may be the first, it quickly becomes clear that Sylvane won't be the last prisoner to reappear from Alcatraz. Through the course of the investigation, Madsen and Soto will learn that Agent Hauser has known about the prison's secret history and has been awaiting the prisoners' return. Soto will witness his life's work – the history of Alcatraz – come alive. Madsen will be forced to keep her supportive San Francisco cop fiancé, JIMMY DICKENS (Santiago Cabrera, "Heroes"), at arm's length from the highly classified assignment as she sees everything she thought she knew about her family's past shattered, all while fighting to keep the country safe from history's most dangerous criminals.

TERRA NOVA

From executive producers Steven Spielberg ("Saving Private Ryan," "Jurassic Park"), Peter Chernin, René Echevarria ("Castle," "The 4400") and Brannon Braga ("24") comes an epic family adventure 85 million years in the making. TERRA NOVA follows an ordinary family on an incredible journey back in time to prehistoric Earth as a small part of a daring experiment to save the human race. In the year 2149, the world is dying. The planet is overdeveloped and overcrowded, with the majority of plant and animal life extinct. The future of mankind is in jeopardy, and its only hope for survival is in the distant past. When scientists at the FERMI Particle Accelerator unexpectedly discovered a fracture in time that made it possible to construct a portal into primeval history, the bold notion was born to resettle humanity in the past – a second chance to rebuild civilization and get it right this time. The series centers on the Shannon family as they join the Tenth Pilgrimage of settlers to Terra Nova, the first colony established in this beautiful yet foreboding land. JIM SHANNON (Jason O'Mara, "Life on Mars"), a devoted father with a checkered past, guides his family through this new world of limitless beauty, mystery and terror. Jim's wife, ELISABETH (Shelley Conn, "Mistresses"), is a trauma surgeon and the newest addition to Terra Nova's medical team. JOSH (Landon Liboiron, "Degrassi: The Next Generation") is their 17-year-old son who is angry to leave life as he knows it behind; upon arriving at the settlement, he finds himself instantly drawn to the beautiful and rule-breaking SKYE (Allison Miller, "Kings"). MADDY (Naomi Scott, "Life Bites"), Josh's endearingly awkward 15-year-old sister, hopes Terra Nova will give her a chance to reinvent herself. Although Elisabeth's medical training secured the family a spot on the pilgrimage, a secret involving their five-year-old daughter, ZOE (newcomer Alana Mansour), soon endangers their place in this utopia. Upon the Shannons' arrival, they are introduced to COMMANDER NATHANIEL TAYLOR (Stephen Lang, "Avatar"), the charismatic and heroic first pioneer and leader of the settlement. Taylor warns the travelers that while Terra Nova is a place of new opportunities and fresh beginnings, all is not as idyllic as it initially appears. Along with blue skies, towering waterfalls and lush vegetation, the surrounding terrain is teeming with danger – and not just of the man-eating dinosaur variety. There is also a splinter colony of renegades led by the battle-hardened MIRA (Christine Adams, "TRON: Legacy"), who is vehemently opposed to Taylor and his leadership. Even more threatening than what lies outside the protective walls of the colony is the chilling possibility that something sinister is happening inside Terra Nova. The Shannons will come to suspect that not everyone on this mission has the same idea of how to best save mankind; in fact, there may be forces intent on destroying this new world before it even begins.

TOUCH

From writer/creator Tim Kring ("Heroes," "Crossing Jordan") and executive producers Peter Chernin and Katherine Pope comes TOUCH, a preternatural drama in which science and spirituality intersect with the hopeful premise that we are all interconnected, tied in invisible ways to those whose lives we are destined to alter and impact. Through masterful storytelling, the series follows a group of seemingly unrelated characters – beginning with a former firefighter tormented by his inability to save a dying woman, an Iraqi teenager who will go to great risks to help his family, a gifted singer whose actions at a karaoke bar save lives thousands of miles away and a British businessman desperately trying to retrieve a key piece of information from his lost mobile phone – who affect each other in ways seen and unseen. At the center is MARTIN BOHM (Kiefer Sutherland, "24"), a widower and single father, haunted by an inability to connect to his mute, severely autistic 10-year-old son, JAKE. Caring, intelligent and thoughtful, Martin has tried everything to reach his son who shows little emotion and never allows himself to be touched by anyone, including Martin. Jake busies himself with cast-off cell phones, disassembling them and manipulating the parts, allowing him to see the world in his own special way. After multiple failed attempts at keeping Jake in school, Martin is visited by social worker CLEA HOPKINS, who insists on doing an evaluation of the Bohms' living situation. Although new at her job, Clea sees a man whose life has become dominated by a child he can no longer control. She believes his attempts to communicate with Jake are just wish fulfillment, and determines that it's time for the state to intervene. But everything changes when Martin discovers that Jake possesses a gift of staggering genius – the ability to see things that no one else can, the patterns that connect everything. Jake is indeed communicating after all. But it's not with words, it's with numbers. And now he needs Martin to decipher their meaning and connect these numbers to the cast of seemingly unrelated characters whose lives they affect. Along the way, Martin will be guided by BORIS PODOLSKY, a discredited aging professor who offers Martin a compelling but unorthodox theory about Jake and his rare ability. Whether it be chance, coincidence, timing, synergy or fate, there are events that touch us all, as part of an interconnected, dazzlingly precise universe.