Monsters of Television

“Burn it. Burn everything.”

Last week on Revolution, Charlie said “family” so many times, the word lost all meaning. It was a very clear message that “family” in the post-apocalypse was going to be an important theme for the show as the core motivation for why anything happened. Unfortunately, whenever I hear the word “family” now, I roll my eyes, even when Revolution isn’t involved.

We’d hoped that this was just a growing pain from the pilot, an issue of establishing themes for the series in a limited amount of time by beating them into our heads (as pilots are wont to do). But, while the second episode isn’t bad, they double down on the discussion of post-civilization morality in a way that is so transparent each segment is like a vignette of thinly-veiled discussion on our modern hot-button issues.

I’m starting to feel like this show is going to desensitize me to ethical debate.

Well, either ethical debate or heavy-handedness. Though The Newsroom has done a pretty good job of killing that part of me.

But let’s talk about the good the episode did. In the pilot, Charlie was one of my least favorite characters on television, like Kate Austen from Lost but somehow whinier and more helpless. I recognize that she’s also unique in being somewhere between adapted to the post-Blackout world and sheltered from its evils. It’s like we’re seeing the origin of badass before she got jaded. For now, however, she’s the juvenile motivation for the group to keep moving, the entry point for the party’s near destruction, and seems to exist exclusively to eliminate Miles’s upperhand. She is simultaneously the whip to keep them moving and the weight around their collective necks.

The second episode mitigated the burden more by (1) releasing her to Miles’s care to free up Maggie and Aaron to explore the flash drive scenarios, (2) letting her prove herself a courageous and worthwhile asset if green in the art of taking on armed troops alone, (3) showing she doesn’t have a soft spot for brooding-ish boys after she’s been betrayed. Did you let out a wail when it looked like she twisted her ankle? I sure did. It appeared to be the epitome of her helplessness, to hurt herself all alone so she could be rescued. I sighed with relief when I learned it was subterfuge to trap Nate and more when she left him chained to the pole.

More good: Giancarlo Esposito continuing to make Tom Neville a complicated character. Danny (a very uncomplicated, one-dimensional doofus) calls him a psychopath but Neville walks that line that is far more interesting than psychopath. He’s desperate and calculated. He obviously cares about the people under his charge and often reminds the audience that “home” is always on his mind, even when he’s trying to exert his dominion over the “criminals” he comes across. Psychopath doesn’t encapsulate the nuance in Neville.

That scene with the deer and the shootout, though, is where I’d already had enough of being hit over the head with undisguised themes of the episode. Sure, this week did a few good things like introducing what will surely be a tearjerking plot point (the iPhone to be eventually switched on), what seems like an Omar character (“Randall”), and revealing that Rachel is still alive (surprise?), I kept getting hung up on these moral quandaries in our modern world that still exist in the post-apocalyptic one.

I grant that, of course, these quandaries would exist as long as humanity does, particularly in what is, ostensibly, the near future. I also know that science fiction has a rich history of contextualizing social issues with aliens or dystopic futures to demonstrate different perspectives but, come on, spread it out a little. Within this episode I saw:

• Gun Control: Monroe Republic is exactly the hypothetical police state ardent defenders of the Second Amendment use rationalize guns in the hands of the people, right down to the fact that guns are banned to those not “loyal” to the government.
• Flag-Burning: The United States and its flag represent rebellion and, presumably, justice in the world. The “bad guys” are flag-burners.
• Euthanasia: Neville gives a dying man poison to put him out of his misery. Interesting, with all the weight the show puts on making him more nuanced that they put the poison in his hands.
• Torture used in Interrogation: Monroe doesn’t approve of its use but then kills the dude for nothing. So — where is that going?
• Terrorism/Military Aggression: Clearly there is an insurgency in the Monroe Republic (disguised as an American rebellion to position sympathies). The insurgents are characterized by the Republic as terrorists while we watch the militia go out of their way to abuse potential rebels and destroy all symbols that represent the clashing culture.

These are certainly issues that are important and perfectly valid to be addressed by the show but they come off a little heavy-handed when they emerge consecutively and so thinly-veiled. Folks, you have plenty of time to get to all of that. Hopefully.

Overall, I think the show is getting its legs and will be able to walk once we get a couple episodes in. I like that Kripke isn’t so much into teasing so we’re getting answers even only two weeks in and the story is still relatively compelling. You get the feeling that, even once we know what caused the Blackout, the story will still be interesting for how these people survive in either attempting to fix what’s been wrought or continuing to rebuild a civilization. And, if we continue to get character development like we have with Charlie and Neville, I look forward to seeing how this works out.

Other things:

• So I guess the sword-fighting is going to be a constant for the series. Also, as if Miles isn’t Han Solo enough, he’s trying to kill a bounty hunter. This scene where he almost puts him down is Charlie at her most dead-weightiest. “Yeah, Charlie. That’s the idea.”
• Are those tiny-circle sunglasses marketed exclusively to the creeps and sage badasses of the world?
• Speaking of creeps, the guy that almost “bashes” tiny Charlie’s face in? The creepiest. And the gunshot has a little bit of Juliet in it. Well-orchestrated scene.
• That Maggie doesn’t think the Blackout is man-made is absurd? What does she think this is? A tree that fell on a powerline? Someone that poured a Big Gulp over a control panel somewhere while the Energizer Bunny is on vacation? Maybe it was ghosts!
• Hello, Nora. I’m really glad that the Blackout killed off all the capable yet unattractive people in the world. What good are you if you can fight but are totally ugly? You have no place in my dystopia.