No Ordinary Family: Episode 1.01 & 1.02 (2010)

A family is transformed into superheroes after a freak accident. They try to forget their powers and live a normal life, only to find out that's not so easy (after all, with great powers comes great responsibility). Later they discover that there are superheroes everywhere, of course this means there are also super villains.

Now tell me, does this in any way sound familiar?

It should. ABC's new family drama is a mishmash of Fantastic Four, The Incredibles and Heroes, and let's be honest, none of those were all that original to begin with. They were all built on a legacy of superheroes stories - comic books in particular - going back nearly a century.

The very ordinary family at the center of No Ordinary Family is comprised of dad Jim Powell, played by Michael Chiklis, who previously had a massive hit with The Shield, and who starred as The Thing in Fantastic Four. He works as a police sketch artist, constantly bullied by the "real" cops. His wife is Stephanie, played by Julie Benz. We know her from Rambo and The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day. She's a successful scientist, and the one who brings home the cash, a source of tension and drama in the family. They have two kids, Daphne (Kay Panabaker) and JJ (Jimmy Bennett). That's right, you've entered a world where Michael Chiklis and Julie Benz can hook up and create Kay Panabaker. How's that for a fantastic setting?

Cue family vacation to reconnect, plane crash in a strange river in South America, and superhero powers for everyone. Jim is suddenly indestructible and can jump really high. Stephanie can run really fast. Daphne can hear other people's thoughts. And JJ gets really good at math. Jim quickly decides he wants to be an actual superhero, he enlists the help of a friend and soon he's out fighting crime. When Stephanie discovers her powers, she realizes that she can be a good mother again, something her career has prevented her from being, but now she's got more free time on her hands, since she can do everything faster. The kids mope around and have teenage angst... Cut to commercial.

No Ordinary Family is a family show. It's not just about a family, it's also for the family. The whole family. Everybody can join, because this show is so G-rated it'll make you vomit. Everything is clean and safe. Actually, to call it "safe" would be the same as describing Mount Everest as a "somewhat sizable pile of dirt". This world feels like those chocolate commercials where grandchildren run to their grandparent in soft focus, to tell them how important they are, or the airline commercials where the well-manicured dad watches the sunset above the clouds with longing in his eyes, while his children are down on the ground waiting for daddy to come home. This is a show where no argument is too big to be solved in the first scene after the break, and where every conversation ends with "I love you" or "I'm so proud of you".

The first and most obvious question is: Do we really need another superhero story? After watching the first two episodes of No Ordinary Family the answer would have to be a resounding "Hell no, and even if we did, this wouldn't be it." Now, don't get me wrong, this show has space to grow, but we know it's never going to mess up the family unit, and since we're stuck with that the show is already too limited for me to care. If we give the show the benefit of the doubt, and say it manages to develop an interesting superhero story, and perhaps even embrace some darkness, it will still be stuck in family-friendly land, and it will still only cover familiar ground. More likely we'll end up with something closer to Lois and Clark than Heroes, with cartoon villains and sanitized violence. From my couch this is a show about superheroes made by people who seem clueless about the subject, not to mention completely uninterested in exploring that aspect, beyond the simple, obvious conflicts.

No Ordinary Family is also troubled by the kind of lazy writing that plagues many primetime shows these days. The pilot episode, for example, is wrapped in the "interview" format, where the two leads talk directly to the camera about their experiences. At the end of the episode we learn that the couple is in therapy to "work out their issues" and the whole story has been told to the therapist. This person is not mentioned in the second episode, so maybe someone said, "wait a second, weren't they supposed to keep their powers a secret?" This is such a clumsy and uninspired storytelling device. But it's the little things that annoy me the most, like the scenes where two characters are walking through busy hallways talking loudly and openly about their top secret secrets! You do realize that even the delivery guy you just passed could pick up on this conversation, right?

The second episode centers around the ongoing struggle of "let's use our powers!" "let's not!" "Let's!" "No!" "Yes!" I think the two leads manage to change their position on this issue EIGHT times during the episode. I'm already bored with this. The show is called NO Ordinary Family, for crying out loud! I think it's safe to assume they're not going to pretend to be a regular family again.

There's real drama to be found in the setup, but you have to be fearless. Like Heroes was the first season. It was written as if every episode would be the last. The drama this kind of writing produced was unparalleled. No Ordinary Family is forced to glean its drama from thin air, and pump up the conflicts to laughable levels. "I could have lost you!" Jim yells, when Stephanie gets into an accident using her powers. The funny bit? She stumbled over a children's bicycle. That's all. Yup, when this is the level of drama, 42 minutes can seem like an eternity.

This is a gigantic step back for Michael Chiklis. This show belongs in the same box as The Commish, so far removed from his stunning performance in The Shield that it's not even funny. It makes his performance in Fantastic Four seem like award material. Julie Benz has problems of her own. Her character must be utterly offensive to women. Here is a successful, beautiful woman, and what does she do when she discovers her superpowers? Why, she uses the extra time she gains to make lunch for the kids, and then she vacuums really fast. As for the kids... Well, I got nothing. The first two episodes never get past the teen-angst, and since the writers have stuck the adults in the show with the "action powers" I can assume they'll never join the action at the same level as their parents.

Maybe they should have called the show No Ordinary Parents, and gotten some drama out of the tension between the kids and the adults, if the adults were living out the kids' fantasies. Just an idea.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Turns out that with great powers comes... more time for bake-sale.

Unsurprisingly No Ordinary Family has been deleted from my "Need To Watch" list.

This is the very definition of modern TV. Dumbed down and simplified until it's completely without taste, packaged in neat little boxes, with all the danger sucked out. So soft around the edges that you can look at it through squinting eyes, and it still looks the same.

These people may have the power to run at the speed of sound, or leap tall buildings in a single bound, but they seem unable to deflect mediocrity. Well, a good superhero needs his kryptonite, I guess.

Nikita: 2.0 (2010)

This is a follow-up to my review of the premiere episode of Nikita, which you can read here.

In the sophomore episode of CWs new secret agent series, Nikita, the corrupt agency Division attempts to make a deal with a shady imprisoned Russian arms dealer, by setting him free. Rouge agent Nikita and her undercover sister-in-arms Alex, attempt to foil these plans, meanwhile the backstory between Nikita and Alex is further developed via flashbacks that show how they met, and how Nikita saved Alex and got her clean.

So with this new episode the series has its head placed squarely on the proverbial chopping block, at least in terms of my involvement. If it doesn't show vast improvements, this'll be the last episode I'll watch. From the word go it's obvious that this dire situation has escaped the attention of the producers (what? they don't read my blog?!) The teaser opening of the story shows Nikita buying a high-powered riffle from a classy black market arms dealer. It turns out he's got other plans for Nikita, but it also turns out that she's prepared for this.

Now, my good friend and screenwriter Lars has taught me one very important thing: Every good scene must have a "turn". There must be a change of direction during the scene that we did not predict going in. The only thing worse than a scene without such a turn of events, is when the turn is so embarrassingly obvious that it hurts. The opening scene of this episode demonstrates the problem, which is symptomatic of everything Nikita has showed us so far.

A meeting with an arms dealer? Gee, I wonder if he'll turn out to be bad (he does.) Gee, I wonder if he'll point the gun at her and say something like "my price has gone up!" (he does.) But maybe Nikita is prepared for this, and has magically emptied his gun, despite not having time for this (she is, she has.) And then, what if she points the gun she was going to buy towards him, even though any moron would know not to keep a weapon like that loaded? (she does, and apparently it IS loaded.) Every scene in the show proceeds along this line. Every tedious turn of events is predictable, and often doesn't make any sense, or is merely badly written.

In fact the whole setup for the show is questionable. I'm sure the folks behind Nikita watched the original film, but apparently they didn't understand it (you should have paid attention to those itty-bitty words at the bottom of the screen.) Take the training facility, for example. In the original the premise is simple: They take people who have nothing to live for, break them down completely, and rebuild them with a new purpose - contract killing. In the series they take insubordinate teens and turn them into highly trained, deadly assassins. How is this best accomplished? Probably not by placing them in a hostile authoritarian environment - the kind of authority they most likely rejected in the first place - where they are treated like shit, offer them NO incentive to improve, and give them plenty of time alone to plot and conspire, or slit each other's throats.

It's probably also a bad idea to pimp out a young, angry girl to be a plaything for a Russian mob guy, two weeks into her training. That's what Division does in this episode, and of course the young girl is Alex. And how do they get her to do this? They tell her nothing... So let me get this straight: You send a girl out in the field, who tried to escape mere weeks ago, she's supposed to whore her body out, there's no objective in the mission, and no one tells her any of this...? Yeah... That'll definitely work.

Another questionable aspect of the whole Alex situation is that in order for the contrived plot to work, she must stay in constant communication with Nikita, from within a HIGHLY secured, secret organization. They're actually IM'ing away on a daily basis, sharing every little detail of their mission! That seems stupid and dangerous to me. Shouldn't they at the very least use a code language or something? Of course they can't do this, because the writers have no other way of spoon-feeding us the information we need. Oh, and remember how I said it was going to be a problem that Nikita had no one to talk to? Well, lo and behold, suddenly her IM client comes with speech software! Everything Alex writes is read by a computer voice, and Nikita can simply talk out loud, to write her back. Maybe I should have given clear instructions... GIVE HER SOME FREAKIN' HUMAN INTERACTIONS, you morons! Nikita needs people around her, or the character won't work. She's already begun to talk to herself ("Who the hell are these guys?" she asks, while crouching alone on a rooftop with a riffle.) They also need to give her some street smarts in a damn hurry. Maggie Q's ass might be as perfect as they come, but Nikita appears to be dangerously inept at that whole secret agent stuff, making one rookie mistake after another. Actually, maybe the writers need street smarts, 'cause they seem to depend on her stupidity to move the plot forward.

The second episode of Nikita has sealed the deal for me. When the show is not downright bad, it's just mediocre - so heartbreakingly mediocre. I won't watch any more episodes, and I hope they cancel the show soon, so Maggie Q can go back to feature films where she belongs. As for the "creative" team I suggest a calming vacation far away from the rat race of serialized television. Go to Europe, or something. I hear Venice is nice.

Nikita: Pilot (2010)

Last Thursday The CW network aired the pilot episode of Nikita - The newest incarnation of the classic French story, about a reluctant assassin, who works for a clandestine government agency.

Luc Besson's original La Femme Nikita from 1990 was a masterstroke of modern action cinema. The less said about the American shot-by-shot remake from 1993 the better. Then came the 1997 TV-series with Peta Wilson in the titular role, which ran for 5 seasons, and managed to stand on its own two unbelievably gorgeous legs. And so we reach 2010, and another TV-series. This time with Maggie Q in the lead role. Did we need that?

The story picks up 3 years after Nikita escaped from Division, the aforementioned agency. Suddenly she's back on the radar. She makes no attempt to conceal her motive: She wants to take down the organisation which has corrupted so many young people, and taught them to kill. The pilot simultaneously tells the story of a new young girl Alex, who is captured and put through the ringer, much like Nikita was in the original story. Her death is faked, and unless she cooperates, she really will be dead. She'll have to train to be a coldblooded assassin, side by side with a bunch of other teens. The episode sets up the two characters Nikita and Alex, their dual storylines, plus the team from Division that will hunt Nikita down.

Let me be blunt: Maggie Q is a goddess. She's stunningly beautiful. She's got a gorgeous body, but she's also got that dangerous look in her eyes. Like she could reach out and snap your neck with one hand, without spilling a drop of the cocktail she's holding in the other. Here's what she's not: She's not warm. She's not emotional. She's not vulnerable. Nikita is, though. The character needs those elements to work, and frankly I can't see Maggie's version carrying this show.

I mean, how is this going to work? Nikita will be all alone on her mission, she'll have no one to communicate with (except through IM), and so inevitably we'll form a bond with the only character we can relate to, Alex. In other words: Nikita will be a background character in a show called Nikita, which will really focus on a character called Alex. Of course, we don't know where the show will end up yet, maybe this is just part of a clever plan, but we need to be included in that plan in a damn hurry, or Nikita will fall flat on its face.

I must also confess, I was actually a bit confused at first. Alex's back-story is identical to the original Nikita's, was this a flashback? Alex's other experiences were also identical (I mean IDENTICAL) to Nikita's experiences in the original film, so what the hell is going on? Okay, obviously I caught on quickly, but why would you want to gamble with the expectations of hardcore fans like this? And why would you create a muddled dual storyline, when what we really need is a single clear line to hook us, and pull us in. Besides, is it just me, or is this more or less Alias? The Nikita part of the story anyway.

On top of the unnecessarily complex setup, the rest of the episode is pretty badly written, stuffed to the brim with low-grade spy clichés. Stuff like a character being COMPLETELY surprised at a new development one moment, only to reveal that this was AAAAAALL PART of the plan 2 seconds later.

As for the other characters... Shane West takes on the part played by Tcheky Karyo in the original, and Gabriel Byrne in the remake. Unfortunately he looks like he's 16 years old. And what's that? Indie talent Aaron Stanford in the thankless role of "the token tech guy"? Say it ain't so... I guess mediocre small films that no one sees don't pay the bills. Then they have Xander Berkeley as the generic angry boss, and Lyndsy Fonseca of Kick-Ass fame as Alex. She's cute, but the character needs SO much work.

Add to this a cheap TV look (there's a reason modern action movies are expensive), badly staged fights, complete lack of blood (despite close-quarter gun-battles and some impressive knife wielding), and you've got one dud of a pilot on your hands. We did not need a remake (or reboot) of Nikita, but if you're going to do it, at least have some style, and remember why the original worked (here's a hint: It's not the action and the spy stuff). I'll check out episode 2, but that's the last chance this show will get. Without massive improvements, Nikita will be dead to me.