Monsters of Television

“It’s the best damn Chinese food I’ve ever had. I could eat it everyday.”

A group of strangers awaken in a deserted hotel in a small, creepy ghost town and have to figure out who has brought them there and why. That is the premise of Persons Unknown. I’m normally a sucker for stories like that (see: Lost or (based on the trailer) Exam) so I was pretty excited going into the pilot. But much like the characters in the show I found myself wondering who the hell brought me here and why were they making me watch this?

I don’t get why they call the show Persons Unknown. I know every one of those characters, I’ve seen them all before. The generic  strangers slowly emerge one by one from their locked hotel rooms. (The key to escape: a key hidden in The Bible in each room. Will religion play a large part in the answers they seek?) They all too easily introduce themselves and start spouting off their life stories, filling us in on their character backgrounds too smoothly. There’s McNair, the overly aggressive black Sergeant, Janet, the worried mother and narrative sympathy exploiter, and Tori, the rich bitch character who seems to have found Maggie Grace’s notes on Shannon from Lost.

The most interesting (used lightly) and infuriating character of the bunch would be self-elected leader Joe. It’s like the writers saw Jack Shepard and tried to one-up him. (Their names even start with the same letter!) Joe is the one to discover the keys in the Bibles. Joe is the one who notices the doors are magnetically locked. Joe is the one who suggests starting a fire to trip the smoke detectors and hopefully open all the doors. Joe is the one who suggests leaving the town to look for help. And oddly enough, Joe is the only one who refuses to talk about himself and his occupation. If you  are looking for a mole, “one of them” in your group, I’d start with this guy.

Speaking of the phrase, “one of them” is said roughly 1.5 million times in this episode. Every time a new character is met or a new theory is offered or someone blinks, “one of them” is uttered and someone is accused. It’s the Persons Unknown version of “The Others” but it is nowhere near as catchy and in one episode is already overused. I hope this mole nonsense is dispelled quickly so I don’t have to hear it anymore.

This episode tries to dispel popular theories on what is happening here from the get-go. Theory #1: they’ve all been kidnapped and are being held for ransom. Maybe, but soldiers and social workers (bland yet shady Moira) don’t really make enough bank to warrant ransom. So that’s out. Theory #2: a Saw-like scenario. But that is deemed ridiculous. Is it though? There are 7 of those damn movies, you could very seriously be in the 8th. Another Lost connection: Michael Emerson (who plays Benjamin Linus if you didn’t know) is in the first Saw film.

So Joe and Janet are going to leave the town and look for help. When they reach a certain point they pass out. McNair goes to get them, passes out too. Then some Chinese guys show up. We learn the members of the group have all been injected with some biometric implant that injects a tranquilizer into their bloodstreams if they go beyond a certain point. Are you getting all of this? These are the story components of the episode. And they are presented in just as muddled and confusing a manner as I just lumped them together. So Tom, boss Chinese man, invites them all into his restaurant for food. Some members of the group demand answers but Tom says he just makes food. And so make them some food he does.

After a meal Tom brings out a plate of fortune cookies. Shannon Tori spins the plate, saying they should leave their fortunes up to fate. And here we have another uninteresting and easy plot device: the fortunes. Each character takes a cookie and opens to reveal a fortune that is specifically tailored for them, despite the attempt to trick fate. Charlie, a man with a sick wife back home, gets a fortune that says his wife is waiting for him. Selfish car salesman man (Bill I think?) gets one that says something about teamwork. Obviously Bill (I think) will learn some sort of lesson about helping others. Yawn. Some of the other fortunes are just as blatant but we do get a few mysteries: McNair’s fortune is in Chinese and Moira’s is all in numbers. Please just stop, Lost you are not. If there is a 4, 8, 15, 16, 23 or 42 anyhwere near her fortune I will go insane. And not Hurley insane, mad with fury insane.

The episode ends with Jack (I have got to stop doing that) Joe and company returning to the hotel to find a mysterious night manager behind the lobby desk. While he can offer no insight into the group’s predicament (he was just hired) he may hold a key yet. Janet unfolds her fortune that says “Kill your neighbor and you’ll go free.” Could the neighbor be the night manager? He did say he lives behind the hotel. Is it one of her fellow strangers?

There’s some small B-plot stuff going down too. 2 San Fransisco cops take a missing mom (Janet) case. One of the cops goes to speak to Janet’s mom. We earn that she was a terrible mother and that she and Janet do not really talk anymore. We also learn that since Janet’s absence, her mother has been watching her daughter. She says she may finally have the chance to be the mother she never could be. Hmm. Creepy. Definitely got some “I know what’s going on” vibes from her. This was the only point of the episode that really piqued my interest.

So in case you couldn’t tell, I did not like Persons Unknown. It is a poor man’s SyFy movie Lost wannabe “mystery”. The characters are boring, the exposition was forced and too simple, the execution is sloppy. I know I’ve made a lot of comparisons to Lost but trust me, even in a world without Lost (and what a terrible world that would be) this show would still suffer. I can’t help if there are similarities. Unfortunately for Persons Unknown though, the only candidate position its characters could fill are candidates to help put me to sleep. That said, I will still tune in next week. 20% to see if it gets better, 30% to make more LOST references and 50% to have more fodder for snarky comments.

FINAL THOUGHTS

• Even though his character is stupid it was nice to see Alan Ruck.
• That’s all. I’m done thinking about this show. Finally. (Noel: Until next week, right…?)