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Wednesday, September 5, 2012

Episode Review: "Pilot" (1x01)

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   The wait is over, the event that was keeping you up all night has arrived and it took us by surprise 2 weeks earlier. Now that we saw the beast into the eyes and the mystery surrounding it is gone, ¿what is the verdict, were all those nights awake worth it? Let’s get right into REVOLUTION and talk about its high points but the low ones too.




   If you haven’t watched it yet I recommend stopping reading because there are some SPOILERS.

   Without waiting the action kicks in right away and in the first minute we are already witness of the biggest catastrophe of mankind, the Blackout. We can see how every modern device starts malfunctioning and eventually turns off, transformers blow up, the entire city vanishes in the darkness and planes fall from the sky. Without getting deeply into the physics, is fair to say that that was a big fail, planes just don’t fall spinning like that, they are designed to glide through the sky and land very smoothly (after all that’s what gliders do). Suddenly they show us an imposing image of the Eart “tuning off” by a wave of darkness, and without stopping to ask “¿Why?”, the clock moves forward 15 years revealing a completely transformed mankind.

   Is fair to say that the action in Revolution is probably the best we had in years from any Pilot Episode, and most of it is thanks to Billy Burke (uncle Miles) who kicks some serious ass and is far from the low-profile dad of the Twilight saga. The one that stands out too is one of the greatest villains there ever was on TV, Gus from Braking Bad, Giancarlo Esposito (Captain Neville). He plays a really manipulative and unscrupulous bad guy, it’s going to be a pleasure to have him in the show. Also Tracy Spiridakos (Charlie) did a great work in the emotional moments like her dad’s death and when she finds her uncle. The rest of the cast where under the radar because they didn’t have enough time on screen, like Elizabeth Mitchell for example that appeared only in two or three scenes.

   Probably the only aspect that bothered about Revolution, is the length of the Episode. 43 minutes for a Pilot is not enough to introduce all the main characters, plots, subplots, etc. The result is an accelerated storytelling pace where some significant time from crucial moment was sacrificed, like the Blackout where a couple of minutes about that moment would have been awesome.

   Although Revolution is being sold under the “J.J. Abrams (genius behind Lost)” name, he is just the Executive Producer here, but we know people buy his name a lot. The real mastermind here is Eric Kripke, who is the creator of another hit, Supernatural. The comparison point with Lost cannot be avoided because Revolution makes use of a technique, besides the mystery, that was the big signature of Lost, the Flashbacks. In this case the Flashbacks will be really important for the development of the story on Revolution, because that’s how they will show us what happens after the Blackout. Let’s hope Revolution doesn’t catch the “Lost successor” fever like many others (Flashforward, The Event).

   The final impression that we get is really good. Although there are some flat characters and dialogs, we have to understand that it is the Pilot Episode, were the urgency for action and mystery to catch more fans is what prevails and not the depth in characters. I think Revolution has a huge potential to success, we only have to wait they refine it. The best is yet to come.


Calification: 4.5/5 Stars. By Revolution Is On

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