DEFYING GRAVITY 1.9 - "Eve Ate The Apple"

[SPOILERS] Defying Gravity has been sucked into a scheduling black hole here in the UK, and I'm probably going to lose track of the show now it's Christmas season. So, purely in the interest of completism, I'll be making an effort to watch the remaining handful of episodes at my own pace (thanks to the internet), but don't expect more reviews until New Year...

I was ready to enjoy "Eve Ate The Apple", after last week's upswing in quality, but it felt hackneyed and corny to me. Everything took a backseat for an episode mainly comprised of flashbacks helping explain what the mystifying "Beta" really is. And it's pretty much what I theorized from the start: a form of alien intelligence. Maybe it's a piece of technology, or maybe it really is a living entity, but it's definitely not man-made and has been responsible for the crew's hallucinations. A few unexpected flourishes are woven into its back-story, though -- like the fact there are apparently more of these artifacts on various planets and moons, which means the Antares mission is effectively one big Easter Egg hunt. At the tax-payer's expense, because the authorities are scared there would be mass panic if people knew aliens existed. Really? By 2052, when we have a fruitful and exciting space program that can send manned trips to other planets, the public still won't embrace the discovery of aliens?

I assume the writers thought putting more alien artifacts on other planets would give them a solid reason for Defying Gravity to continue past one season, but it doesn't feels like a compelling way to extend things, to me. How many pre-training flashbacks were they expecting us to deal with, exactly? Defying Gravity has already taken a painstaking eight episodes just to address the one interesting aspect of the show, so I doubt it would stand any chance of holding audience interest by travelling to different parts of the solar system collecting glowing fractal eggs. Anyway, Defying Gravity was such a bomb in the States that it was pulled by ABC, and even the BBC have quietly moved it to a graveyard slot now, so there's no chance of more episodes beyond this year. It would have been a terrible idea, let's be honest.

For me, there just wasn't anything about "Eve Ate The Apple" that was original or fascinating, unless you've never encountered science fiction in your life -- particularly 2001: A Space Odyssey. So yes, "Beta" is some kind of Monolith-like beacon that exudes "whale song", discovered thirteen years ago by Eve (Karen LeBlanc) in Nazca, Peru, when she was part of the American Crisis Corp. A nearby private army of the mysterious Bertram Corporation were having difficulty locating "Beta" (so-called because it was the earthbound "beta" signal detected by their observatory techies, who also picked up an "alpha" signal transmitting from Mars), so Eve proved invaluable because she has a kind of psychic connection with the entity. A bond shared by the crew of Antares, who have seemingly been chosen by "Beta" itself to go on this multi-billion dollar mission -- explaining why certain astronauts suffered problems that resulted in them being sent back home in the earlier episodes.

I suppose there are a few interesting avenues to possibly explore hereon in, but I'm not sure if this is just me overanalyzing things in desperation to find an entertaining angle. The Biblical title could be a clue; "Beta" communicates through visions of the crew's most shameful or guilty experiences, and it was only after Eve ate an apple from the Tree of Knowledge that her and Adam came to understand shame through her sin. Eve Weller-Shaw is assumedly our modern-day Eve, and it seems Paula (Paula Garcés) has turned to religion to explain "Beta" as a sign of The Rapture, so does "Paula" equate to "Paul" -- Jesus Christ's disciple who originally spread Christianity to the world? The fractal tomato plant that "Beta" made grow was possibly some symbol of the Garden Of Eden, too? Oh, and Maddux Donner = Madonna?

Over thinking, right?


12 December 2009
BBC2/BBC HD, 11.40pm

written by: Blythe Robe directed by: Peter Howitt starring: Ron Livingston (Maddux Donner), Malik Yoba (Ted Shaw), Andrew Airlie (Mike Goss), Paula Garcés (Paula Morales), Florentine Lahme (Nadia Schilling), Karen LeBlanc (Eve Weller-Shaw), Ty Olsson (Rollie Crane), Eyal Podell (Dr. Evram Mintz), Maxim Roy (Claire Dereux), Dylan Taylor (Steve Wassenfelder), Christina Cox (Jen Crane) & Laura Harris (Zoe Barnes)

DEFYING GRAVITY 1.8 - "Love, Honor, Obey"

[SPOILERS] Finally, after seven weeks of teasing and sappy relationship melodrama, Defying Gravity conjurs an episode that held my interest throughout. "Love, Honor, Obey" was the episode where the crew of the Antares started to realize Mission Control have been keeping the contents of "Pod 4" a secret from them, which is something we've been waiting weeks to see. Indeed, the series has unwisely tried to stretch out this "Beta" mystery far too long, as I'd have given up around episode 5 if it wasn't for people assuring me everything from episode 8 onwards it surprisingly decent entertainment...

As usual, flashbacks to pre-mission training 5 years ago were again used, this time to put across the idea of blind obedience to authority figures, wherein the Milgram Experiment was trotted out. Basically, that infamous experiment proved that many people will knowingly inflict pain on another person if they're instructed to do so by a calm, detached superior. Here, trainee astronauts played a memory game of "Simon" where failure resulted in painful electric shocks -- first of themselves, then of a colleague. This training to be blindly obedient was actually quite worrying when you think about it: historically it partly explains why Nazi's at concentration camps went through with their heinous crimes (they were absolved of ultimate responsibility), and now it's being used so that future astronauts do exactly as they're told by? Wouldn't you rather train people to respect the chain of command but ultimately take responsibility for their own actions, if they're convinced it's for the greater good?

Anyway, Donner (Ron Livingstone) is confused that he can't access Pod 4's contents -- which seems to be the source of their hallucinations -- and Mission Control try to distract everyone from their curiosity by faking a solar flare event that will douse everyone in harmful radioactivity unless they get to a protected part of the ship. Again, flashbacks echoed this technique of false distraction, when a test was interrupted by an apparent fire and the class were evacuated. But in the present, having realized that NASA have tricked them, this only resolves their desire to access Pod 4, which opens and bathes them all in an orangey glow. So, the cat's out of the bag, and I guess we'll see what this mysterious "Beta" force is in episode 9. My guess is some kind of alien entity that needs to be returned to Venus. But I'm still confused that the crew weren't just told this was the mission all along; particularly as Ted (Malik Yoba) appears to have coped with the truth very well.

Overall, this was certainly the best episode Defying Gravity has done, from an admittedly poor bunch. It's also the first written by someone with a decent screenwriting pedigree (Desperate Housewives' Susan Nirah Jaffe), so while she was slightly hamstrung by what's gone before and the soapy format of the show, she did a good job job making it all look interesting and exciting. I'll even let it slide that this episode involved discussion of the Milgram Experiment and Schrödinger's Cat, which are both grossly overused in sci-fi circles. This was also the first time I only checked the time once and was surprised (and slightly disappointed) to see the episode only had four minutes left to run. It usually has another twenty minutes and my heart sinks.

It's still true that I don't really care about any of the characters or their backstories (of which only Donner and Zoe's is even half-memorable), I'm just naturally curious about this whole "Beta" mystery that's been ongoing since the start. If it proves to be of a ridiculous and totally implausible nature, expect a supernova of anger that they've strung me along to be so sorely disappointed. But, for now, I'm looking forward to getting some answers in the next episode.


28 November 2009
BBC2/BBC HD, 10.40pm

written by: Susan Nirah Jaffe directed by: Fred Gerber starring: Ron Livingston (Maddux Donner), Malik Yoba (Ted Shaw), Andrew Airlie (Mike Goss), Paula Garcés (Paula Morales), Florentine Lahme (Nadia Schilling), Karen LeBlanc (Eve Weller-Shaw), Ty Olsson (Rollie Crane), Eyal Podell (Dr. Evram Mintz), Maxim Roy (Claire Dereux), Dylan Taylor (Steve Wassenfelder), Christina Cox (Jen Crane), Laura Harris (Zoe Barnes), Ari Cohen (David Sellner), Barclay Hope (Candy Exec), William C. Vaughan (Arnel Poe), Dante Lee Arias (Roy Shaw), Michael St. John Smith (Board Member), Lara Gilchrist (Sharon), Bruce Dawson (Vapor Trails), Nicole Muñoz (Palestinian Girl) & Bob Paris (Beta Tech)

DEFYING GRAVITY 1.7 - "Fear"

[SPOILERS] I've gone space-crazy. My consciousness drifts in and out of Defying Gravity now; a glazed expression descending every time Donner (Ron Livingston) gives us another of his easygoing, patronizing voice-overs. It's all very didactic and stilted. Anyway, it's Halloween (prematurely scheduled in the US, belatedly so in the UK), and "Fear" revolved around the Antares crew having to act in a live, televised commercial for a confectioners who have pumped $10 billion into the mission. I guess selling chocolate is big business in 2052; maybe everyone who isn't affiliated with NASA are fat, chocoholic couch potatoes glued to the mission on TV?

"Fear" was dull, sadly. Worse, while it featured an abundance of the hallucinations that have kept my interest during all the boring episodes before now, they were cumulatively just as tedious. It's all dusty helmets, Martian storms, crying babies and trapped girls, which has just become monotonous. The only vision that piques my interest is of the Russian astronaut seeing what looks like herself in a fake beard -- is her tragic back-story that she used to be a man?

Defying Gravity keeps reminding us that mysterious cargo "Beta" is having an adverse mental effect on everyone, and it's now belabouring the point. The only upside here is that events spiraled so out of control (with the live advert ditched when they all freeze in various states of reverie before a space-walk), that they all had to admit what's been going on. Maybe now the show will progress and start giving us some firm answers about what "Beta" is. But I'm not sure I really care now, and I've never trusted the show to give us a good answer anyway. If one does materialize -- thank God for small mercies. If one doesn't -- I'm going to throw a brick at the screen. Why weren't the crew just told about "Beta" and its affects, anyway? Ted (Malik Yoba) was later briefed and he didn't react angrily to the news, so why not just tell them what's going on?

I've been told the show suddenly becomes very watchable from hereon in, as the mission approaches its end, but we'll see...


21 November 2009
BBC2/BBC HD, 10.40pm

written by: Chris Provenzano directed by: Jeff Woolnough starring: Ron Livingston (Maddux Donner), Malik Yoba (Ted Shaw), Andrew Airlie (Mike Goss), Paula Garcés (Paula Morales), Florentine Lahme (Nadia Schilling), Karen LeBlanc (Eve Weller-Shaw), Ty Olsson (Rollie Crane), Eyal Podell (Dr. Evram Mintz), Maxim Roy (Claire Dereux), Dylan Taylor (Steve Wassenfelder), Christina Cox (Jen Crane), Laura Harris (Zoe Barnes), Ari Cohen (David Sellner), Barclay Hope (Candy Exec), William C. Vaughan (Arnel Poe), Dante Lee Arias (Roy Shaw), Michael St. John Smith (Board Member), Lara Gilchrist (Sharon), Bruce Dawson (Vapor Trails), Nicole Muñoz (Palestinian Girl) & Bob Paris (Beta Tech)

I hang up Hung, Defying Gravity defies my axe, but my iris closes on Stargate Universe

There never seemed to be much appetite for Hung reviews around here (seriously, am I the only one watching?), so I've decided to retire the show from weekly review. I'll still tune in every Thursday on More4, but it's not really worth my time putting a review together that nobody appears interested to read. I still quite like the show, but it's perhaps not that conducive to episodic review. Anyway, the time will be used to instead review BBC1's new five-part sci-fi thriller Paradox, which starts tomorrow at 9pm.

"On the bubble" for me is Defying Gravity, which I'm primarily watching because a few commenters insist it gets really good around episode 8. Its timeslot has now moved from 9pm Wednesdays to 11pm Saturdays, which isn't a good sign, but at least the BBC are unlikely to just pull it off-air. Anyway, thanks to the wonders of Virgin+, I tend to watch it on Tuesday.

Not that I ever reviewed it, but I've also stopped watching Stargate Universe now. Six episodes is more than enough time to know if a show's worth sticking with, and SGU just isn't. My patience snapped during the scene where Eli (in someone else's body, using a "communication stone") went back home to see his mother. It just suddenly dawned on me that I have no interest in Eli, his mother, his predicament, or anything else going on aboard Destiny.

It'll be interesting to see if it gets a second season, though. It's received a critical mauling and the venerable fans don't seem impressed. For a show that was supposed to draw in new audiences, it appears to have bored newbies to tears very quickly and simultaneously alienated the existing fan-base. Good move, guys! It is a shame, though, as I could change four things about the show that would make it immeasurably better overnight (1, get rid of those "stones"; 2, take the autopilot off the ship; 3, write some decent female characters; 4, involve more 'gating and aliens.)

DEFYING GRAVITY 1.6 - "Bacon"

[SPOILERS] I was right, the BBC sneaked out Defying Gravity's sixth episode late on Saturday without telling anyone, but this fact didn't elude my trusty digibox -- although I'm still wondering if the joke's actually on me. The midway point of space-soap Defying Gravity had even more of a clinical feel than usual, as we gained some insight into Dr. Mintz (Eyal Podell) after Paula (Paula Garcés) became the victim of a workplace accident while loading (weightless) containers. Where there's blame there's a claim..?

Again, the flashbacks were on-hand to illuminate decisions and reponses the crew make when dealing with any given crisis. "Bacon" was a medically-focused episode, revealing that Donner (Ron Livingstone) can't stand the sight of blood, that Zoe (Laura Harris) terminated her pregnancy and fell sick because of an ovarian cyst, and that Mintz's hallucinations of a little girl trapped under rubble is a repressed memory of wartime horror. The problem with the flashbacks is that there's never much doubt about what's going to happen in them (it's evident nobody will die or fail to get picked for the mission), and we can construe a lot from people's interactions aboard Anthares without needing a flashback to confirm things.

Still, there was mild fun in seeing someone cut their thumb off in zero-gravity, leading to thousands of blood droplets suspended in the air that had to be sucked up by vacuum cleaner, and I quite enjoy the glimpses of 2052's technology and culture (a recreational drug exists that's totally undetectable, for e.g.) But it's all trimmings to what was ultimately a thin episode that didn't have the guts to surprise you. I had my fingers crossed that Paula would die, if only to see how the crew would handle that tragedy -- particularly Wassenfelder (Dylan Taylor), who blamed himself for her accident. And how would they have dealt with the body -- put it on-ice until they return home for a proper funeral, or launch her into space? We'll never know, as everything was wrapped up too neatly and Mintz saved the day.

It's never a good sign when you find yourself intrigued by imagined alternatives to the story being presented, is it.


14 November 2009
BBC2/BBC HD, 10.40pm

written by: Meredith Lavender directed by: Marcie Ulin starring: Ron Livingston (Maddux Donner), Malik Yoba (Ted Shaw), Andrew Airlie (Mike Goss), Paula Garcés (Paula Morales), Florentine Lahme (Nadia Schilling), Karen LeBlanc (Eve Weller-Shaw), Ty Olsson (Rollie Crane),Eyal Podell (Dr. Evram Mintz), Maxim Roy (Claire Dereux), Dylan Taylor (Steve Wassenfelder), Christina Cox (Jen Crane) & Laura Harris (Zoe Barnes)

DEFYING GRAVITY 1.5 - "Rubicon"

[SPOILERS] I'm not sure how long I'm going to continue with reviews of Defying Gravity. It's taken me five days to get around to watching this fifth episode and, despite the fact the announcer claimed it won't be back for two weeks, my digibox recorded an episode that aired late on Saturday (which I assume is the sixth episode), so are the BBC in a hurry to burn this show off now? Or has my box recorded a repeat, silly thing.

"Rubicon" wasn't a terrible episode, comparatively speaking. It's just that Defying Gravity's the kind of show where blondes answer the door with tubs of Häagen-Dazs, and mothers use Tarot cards to pry into their daughter's love-lives. There's also a drinking game in how many times characters say "nominal" on this show! I started to notice that quirk a few weeks ago. It's like the writers have no deep knowledge of space terminology, but they've latched onto that word as something that sounds authoritative and realistic. Oddly, "nominal" means "ostensible", "titular" or "insignificant" in my thesaurus, but is bandied around as meaning "normal" here. Maybe the word takes on fresh meaning in the mid-21st century.

I quite liked how the flashbacks revolved around personal possessions the characters felt attached to, which were later put into a time-capsule aboard Antares to mark the "point of no return" for their mission (a.k.a "Rubicon"), and it seems that the visions Donner (Ron Livingstone) is experiencing can be quite helpful, as he hallucinates Martian dust on equipment that proves to be faulty. So is this "Beta" cargo they're unwittingly carrying not quite as malevolent as we'd been led to believe? It was also a nice twist that footage of the tragic Mars mission came to light that proves Donner's nemesis Mike Goss (Andrew Airlie) was responsible for the misfortune -- because he lost his cool under pressure -- but he's hidden the video evidence and pinned the blame on Donner. The scoundrel.

So yes, there are a few bright moments, but it's still a very drippy television show. I can't see sci-fi fans really enjoying it because things are quite clichéd, nor can I imagine the target demographic of young women choosing to watch it purely for the relationships (which are the least compelling thing about Defying Gravity). It's a syrupy mess, really, but brainless entertainment if you have 43-minutes to kill and a tolerance for irksome dialogue and daft voice-overs. And I'm still intrigued about this "Beta" thing, God help me.

This show doesn't get many comments here -- so is anyone watching, or am I the lone viewer?


12 November 2009
BBC2/BBC HD, 9pm

written by: Meredith Lavender & Marcie Ulin directed by: Marcie Ulin starring: Ron Livingston (Maddux Donner), Malik Yoba (Ted Shaw), Andrew Airlie (Mike Goss), Paula Garcés (Paula Morales), Florentine Lahme (Nadia Schilling), Karen LeBlanc (Eve Weller-Shaw), Ty Olsson (Rollie Crane),Eyal Podell (Dr. Evram Mintz), Maxim Roy (Claire Dereux), Dylan Taylor (Steve Wassenfelder), Christina Cox (Jen Crane) & Laura Harris (Zoe Barnes)

DEFYING GRAVITY 1.4 - "H2IK"

[SPOILERS] This was the first episode I found myself half-enjoying. "H2IK" was a more typical space-faring story with a clichéd dilemma at its core, but all that was preferable to the soap melodrama that's choked the series from the start. The Antares is struck by a perplexing power loss that even causes localized weightlessness, and everyone's at a loss to explain the fault. Is the mission over before it's really begun, and a return to Earth on the cards? Or can the recupering Ajay (Zahf Paroo) on terra firma offer some assistance, as flashbacks reveal he was part of the team that build the ship's malfunctioning systems?

"H2IK" (an acronym for "hell if I know"; no, I don't get it either) was pretty weak and predictable, but it was a formula Defying Gravity could ape with the minimum of fuss and provide a fairly entertaining hour. The flashbacks clicked with the present-day story more snugly, the explanation for the malfunction was plausible, and I liked getting more information about the tragic Mars mission that has blighted Donner's (Ron Livingstone) career. The sequence where a space-walking Donner was confronted by the ghosts of the two crewmen he left behind (one of whom we learn was his girlfriend) was handled very well, and it now seems clear that the "Beta" cargo they're carrying is something able to make past tragedies come back to life in the minds of the tormented.

Overall, "H2IK" was a pleasant enough viewing experience, possibly helped by the fact I'm getting better at ignoring Donner's trite voice-overs and I'm looking through the sucky relationships at the few things that interest me: the ultimate aim of the mission, the weird Beta mystery and the hallucinations it elicits, and the fact there appears to be a Mission Control-led conspiracy. It's still a poor show crippled by its syrupy tone and stilted dialogue, but there are toeholds to keep you hanging on.


5 November 2009
BBC2/BBC HD, 9pm

written by: Brett Conrad directed by: Fred Gerber starring: Ron Livingston (Maddux Donner), Malik Yoba (Ted Shaw), Andrew Airlie (Mike Goss), Paula Garcés (Paula Morales), Florentine Lahme (Nadia Schilling), Karen LeBlanc (Eve Weller-Shaw), Ty Olsson (Rollie Crane), Zahf Paroo (Ajay Sharma), Eyal Podell (Dr. Evram Mintz), Maxim Roy (Claire Dereux), Dylan Taylor (Steve Wassenfelder), Peter Howitt (Trevor Williams), Christina Cox (Jen Crane) & Laura Harris (Zoe Barnes)

DEFYING GRAVITY 1.3 - "Threshold"

I tuned in for the third episode of Defying Gravity, but there was probably less of interest than the already disappointing first two episodes. For that reason, I won't be blogging about each episode every week. For me, the show has a largely sickly tone when it comes to the relationships between its characters, I hate the mawkish voice-overs by Ron Livingstone's character, the flashbacks to pre-mission training don't interest me, and there's not enough time spent making the present-day mission appear all that exciting....

Regarding the latter, I'm sure things will improve once they approach their planetary destination, and one commenter last week suggested the show starts to find a groove around episode 8 -- but that's a long time to wait. The only thing that's going to keep me watching awhile longer is the mystery of the secret cargo the Anthares ship is carrying (which seems tied to those phantom baby cries and one astronaut's Martian flashbacks.) Given Defying Gravity's problems elsewhere, I'm not confident the show will handle this sci-fi element with any great skill, so I'm primed for disappointment once the cloud of obscurity clears. But, who knows, maybe the show will surprise me in the end -- if I make it that far.


29 October 2009
BBC2/BBC HD, 9pm

written by: Sheri Elwood starring: Peter Howitt starring: Ron Livingston (Maddux Donner), Malik Yoba (Ted Shaw), Andrew Airlie (Mike Goss), Paula Garcés (Paula Morales), Florentine Lahme (Nadia Schilling), Karen LeBlanc (Eve Weller-Shaw), Ty Olsson (Rollie Crane), Zahf Paroo (Ajay Sharma), Eyal Podell (Dr. Evram Mintz), Maxim Roy (Claire Dereux), Dylan Taylor (Steve Wassenfelder), Peter Howitt (Trevor Williams), Christina Cox (Jen Crane) & Laura Harris (Zoe Barnes)

DEFYING GRAVITY 1.1 & 1.2 - "Pilot" & "Natural Selection"

[SPOILERS] Space is a broad canvas that many different artists have painted on, offering us their individual perspectives -- from George Lucas' fairy tale fantasy of Star Wars, through Gene Roddenbery's human commentary of Star Trek, Ronald D. Moore's allegorical Battlestar Galactica, and Stanley Kubrick numinous sci-fi epic 2001: A Space Odyssey -- to name just four bright stars in the galaxy. There's certainly room for a human relationships drama with a celestial backdrop, but Defying Gravity ironically fails to get off the ground...

It's 2052 A.D. NASA are launching a six-year mission around the Solar System in a spaceship named Antares, to be manned by eight astronauts: Israeli doctor Evram Mintz (Eyal Podell); Canadian biologist Jen Crane (Christina Cox), German pilot Nadia Schilling (Florentine Lahme); chief engineer Maddux Donner (Ron Livington), who infamously left two colleagues to die on the surface of Mars during a previous mission; landing pilot and documentarian Paula Moales (Paula Garcés); theoretical physicist Steve Wassenfelder (Dylan Taylor); commander Ted Shaw (Malik Yoba); and pixie-like geologist Zoe Barnes (Laura Harris), the inexperienced astronaut who slept with Donner while she was a rookie.

Inspired by the excellent 2004 BBC docu-drama Space Odyssey: Voyage To The Planets, this multi-national production was pitched as "Grey's Anatomy in space" but it's unstable in its twin desire to be a space-faring adventure and a tight relationship drama. Many of the characters are romantically entangled with colleagues, or at least have a sexual history together that causes tension, but the constant flashbacks to reveal their backstories are mainly distracting.

It's difficult to get excited about the current mission, or feel anxious about its tribulations (a crazy doctor, someone blown out of an airlock), because the show always has one eye on tedious events that happened months ago. In fact, I'd argue that ditching the flashback structure and telling a linear story (training to mission) would have built more anticipation and interest. Space is the final frontier, but all sense of a frontiersman spirit in the face of the unknown is suffocated by Defying Gravity always looking in the rear-view.

There are a few things that keep you watching: the special effects are crisp, accomplished and largely convincing (save for the occasional obvious greenscreen shot), particularly in HD; and there are hints of a mystery relating to something called "Beta" stowed as cargo, together with the suggestion NASA have an ulterior motive for the whole mission. But on the opposite side of the scale are its dull relationships, often atrocious dialogue, and a non-linear structure that doesn't help its cause. There are also some unintentionally amusing moments of ridiculous drama, too -- like when Donner slugged a superior, jumped aboard a shuttle, blasted off into space, then talked through his windscreen to a crazy Indian doctor sat atop Antares' exterior hull! I guess hopping on shuttles is like hailing a taxi mid-century, and nobody aboard the orbiting Antares could have dealt with the problem?

Ironically, Defying Gravity feels too weightless to grip anyone but the most easily pleased. Any hint of a sharp edge has been smoothed over -- assumedly in a misguided attempt to appeal to a female demographic. The sadness being that most women watching are likely to be just as bored by Maddux/Zoe as the guys watching. And its few glints of intrigue (the phantom baby, Maddux's recurring dream of Zoe floating naked into space) aren't central enough to make me confident they aren't idle flourishes. Maybe it'll improve once the mission is significantly advanced, the fog of the "Beta" mystery dissipdates, and the flashbacks becomes infrequent (or actually have greater baring on people's decision-making, a la Lost), but I'm not convinced the quality of writing is strong enough to chart a worthwhile course through the stars.


21 October 2009
BBC2/BBC HD, 9pm

written by: James D. Parriott directed by: David Straiton (1.1) & Peter Howitt (1.2) starring: Ron Livingston (Maddux Donner), Malik Yoba (Ted Shaw), Andrew Airlie (Mike Goss), Paula Garcés (Paula Morales), Florentine Lahme (Nadia Schilling), Karen LeBlanc (Eve Weller-Shaw), Ty Olsson (Rollie Crane), Zahf Paroo (Ajay Sharma), Eyal Podell (Dr. Evram Mintz), Maxim Roy (Claire Dereux), Dylan Taylor (Steve Wassenfelder), Peter Howitt (Trevor Williams), Christina Cox (Jen Crane), Laura Harris (Zoe Barnes), Charles Haid (Maddux's Father), William C. Vaughan (Arnel Poe), Leanne Adachi (Suki Cho), Lara Gilchrist (Sharon), D. Neil Mark (Walker), Adrian Hough (CAPCOM) & Michael St. John Smith (ISO Man)