Reviews

This show wants to copy the portrayal of women in the workplace (and their status in the world in general in the late 60s and early 70s) that was so well done in Mad Men. My first reaction is this is one of those Hollywood knee-jerks, where we see a spate of new shows trying to cash in on the popularity established by a hit show. Unfortunately, most don't get anywhere close to the level of what they are copying.

It's not a bad pilot, and more watchable than most similar shows, but not great. That said, I'm sure it will get green-lit by Amazon.

If they are trying to be true and accurate in the events they write about, they will need to do better. In the first few minutes, one character locates Altamont as if it's in the Oakland suburbs, and later it's mentioned as being just outside Berkeley. That's some lazy writing ...

I know that many reviews will refer to the "gimmick" of immortality, but the main thing that makes me like this show is the writing. Too many shows "force" situations in order to manipulate a plot, but Forever avoids that most of the time. Very refreshing.

Even though Monk solves 50 crimes in a row, nobody believes his opinions in the 51st case, just so everyone can be proved wrong yet again. On about every third Castle episode, Kate or Javier or Kevin or all 3 jump to the conclusion a particular suspect is guilty 5 seconds into the investigation, just so we can burn 30 minutes watching an obvious red herring being revealed. And so on in many otherwise good shows.

In Forever, they get on with the story. Someone doubts Henry's unusual opinion, and Jo stops them with a "hey, he hasn't been wrong yet" or the equivalent. Alana De La Garza plays her character perfectly. The flashback parallels make the procedural interesting instead of formulaic. And the subtle "life is too short, make the most of it" theme is woven into each episode gracefully.

I do hope this show earns sufficient numbers to be renewed. I am really, really tired of shows with good writing and interesting characters being dumped during or after one season ...

I am a James Spader fan, so I had great hopes for this show going in. His acting, the character he inhabits, and most of the dialog written for him, are excellent. It is sad that the rest of each script and his supporting cast are a shambles.

It is as if every episode has two writers - a top-notch one who does a great job of crafting Spader's lines and actions, and a hack who churns out formulaic full-of-holes predictable drivel for everyone else. It's almost painful to watch each episode bounce between the two extremes.

The inconsistencies are mind-boggling. In a couple of episodes, Lizzy destroys her opponent hand-to-hand, yet in every other episode she is completely over-matched and easily disarmed. Time after time, Lizzy and Donald are sent into situations alone with no backup, where they invariably corner the bad guy and then invariably let him escape. In one episode, the Pavlovich Brothers are portrayed as top mercenaries, planning their operations with microscopic precision, always a step ahead of everyone. Yet in a later episode they are all gunned down in the most generic of generic shootout scenes.

Lizzy is supposed to be a profiler, yet shows absolutely no ability for that, responding with a "huh?" shocked reaction every time something "surprising" is revealed about a character. Nearly every episode, she and Donald do their best to prove they are the worst FBI agents ever, either losing suspects or unnecessarily killing anyone who could have provided useful information. Yes, TV requires the viewer to suspend their disbelief a bit, but the repeated incompetence is too much.

Hopefully, there will be significant improvement in the writing next season and that will lift the acting of Spader's supporting cast. Because aside from Spader, season 1 was just cringe-worthy ...

Other than a decent performance by Vincent D'Onofrio, I thought this movie was really poor. I don't know why Bruce Willis signed up for this, his role was a glorified cameo. Walking fast + talking fast (and nearly unintelligibly) = conveying a sense of intensity? Is that from a high school Directing 101 class? Add huge holes in the plot and cheesy special effects and the film was a big disappointment. The director's background is chiefly stuntwork and episodic TV, I think he was clearly out of his depth on this project.

The exploits of the main character Jeremy (Josh Duhamel) are simply not believable. He somehow effortlessly tracks down bad guys, is continually beaten up (but never shows a bruise or acts injured) and is repeatedly disarmed, but the professional thugs never manage to finish him off? And the bad guys easily find where Jeremy and Talia (Rosario Dawson) are hiding, but their hit-man chooses to noisily shoot at them from a mile away instead of just quietly plugging them in their room?

I have no trouble suspending disbelief when necessary, but a movie of this genre is supposed to at least try to be somewhat realistic in its portrayal of action and basic plot. Sadly, this one does not come close ...