So tonight's episode of Revolution features a time honored tradition among dramatic shows; the hallucinations. You know those things that often grow a character through the facing of his own internal fears that make people grow crazy... It also contains... *clears throat*
Music by Led Zeppelin!
The NBC promo made a pretty big deal about this but why make a big deal about it? this isn't the voice or CSI or even The Office for that matter...
It
should effectively grow the characters and it should give us a better insight on them but there one shocking thing this episode made me realize though.
Stargate Universe did it way better.
This is by far the
weakest episode of Revolution; much of it has to do in the most claustrophobic environment possible with some of the most boring scenes ever. For much of the episode, Miles, Charlie, Nora, some girl and a rebellion leader trek through the caves, trying to find the essential way out all while they wait for their hallucinations to appear;
this is all they do, there's barely
any character interaction between them or sense of dialog, watching them just walk is boring unless we have a
reason to care and in this case we
don't. The show hasn't given much of anything regarding Danny's consistency, Monroe's certainty or the scope of the threat in order to give the situation they're in much weight; they want the feeling to be marching towards something dramatic, trekking in hopes that they can stop the evil Monroe empire and rescue Danny but it's the
opposite of that.
The hallucinations they go through are
uninspired and
generic with the added side of being
predictable and unconvincing. We get the usual guys running around, nothing's there; there's a crocodile on my leg, no there isn't; my wife is suddenly next to me talking about how weak I am; we even get one where it happens in a full room and to each one those happens to,
nothing new is revealed about them and in some cases, it even dilutes the characters as a whole. We already know that Nora is afraid of dieing, afraid of being weak; we know that Aaron causes a whole lot of grief to his wife and we certainly know Charlie and her father. The only thing that is truly
notable is Miles' hallucination where he faces off with Monroe but even that is
weak, mainly because it just dwells on the guilt without really dawning upon it. (but I will admit that the whole turning back the militia thing is somewhat interesting.)
Aaron and Miles' hallucinations could of been passable but instead they continue to neglect knowledge, I understand if you want to have someone face off with a wife who's feelings are hurt but seriously, to make it seem as if there's some sort of a conflict where he's stronger than one than with the other isn't going to do wonders; Aaron tried to survive and found himself failing at every turn, he wanted to mean something (while also neglecting the science and engineering skills that he has), to ignore that is questionable. As for Miles... this confirms the long standing suspicion I had on him, that he broke apart because of a difference of opinion but this is where it really gets confusing,
I thought Miles was the one who started the republic. He saw the abuse that was going on, the flashbacks really implied it and yet it's insisted here that Monroe was in control, that Miles was his lapdog and he was put into a position to kill him. Okay, but if Monroe was in charge while did Miles still kill, heck why does he even want to kill Monroe if he acted as if he was in charge and killed without remorse? This really
damages what they have going on for Monroe.
Charlie also gets into many near death incidents here and every time I was cheering for her to die and jeering any attempts to save her; which should not happen. I don't know why she's so weak, maybe it's the actor, maybe it's the character, maybe it's her story; all I know is that every line seems "
righteous", she can't "
emote", she can't "
act" and she certainty can't show "
character". It's admirable that they tried to inject character in the form of certain scenes; showing the bond of the crew, placing her in an emotional state of death but I didn't care for both of them,
especially that her father was in her dream world.
Every moment is a chance to turn it around, she has a
chance to show legitimate emotion, hook the audience into her character; she even has a change to look normal but every moment that also passes is one that convinces me of her lack of appeal, lack of talent... I understand why the characters would save her, it is TV after all but honestly, the characters
shouldn't be second fiddle constantly saving her life; seeing Miles trying to save Charlie just made me
yell at my TV screen.
The only really good parts of this episode are the scenes regarding Monroe and Rachel. We really get to see what's behind Rachel, she is just so cunning and devious as she works on the device; she faces off with people like Nevil and a militia general but she doesn't show any fear, no she just shows narcissism while she shows off the device and explains how it's going to be used and we also get the
best surprise when we see Rachel's true colors; who knew that she had second doubts about what's going on and who knew that she would do
anything just to value her life; it just gives her character importance, makes the Monroe plot really interesting and even though Monroe acted like Darth Vader (though I will admit living up to his bargain was good); he was ever so
essential in bringing out that side of Rachel, one which isn't the clear cut personality we thought she was.
In closing: this episode is
terrible. I'd go so far as to say that this is the
worst hallucination episode ever in the history of sci-fi. Everything about this episode screams gimmicky and uninspired; there is no reason to care for our characters and much of what is revealed about them is inconsequential, heck even the two songs from Led Zeppelin are out of place. The only good parts are the scenes regarding Monroe and Rachel but you certainly don't want to watch 44 minutes just to get that. I am
not looking forward to the midseason finale at all...
