Jake Peffer reviews the pilot episode of J.J. Abrams and Erik Kripke’s new TV show, the post-apocalyptic sci-fi series Revolution…
NBC’s latest big budget show comes in the form of Revolution, which follows the story of an unknown phenomenon that disables all advanced technology on the planet. This forces people to adapt to a world without technology. We jump fifteen years later and see how the world has progressed without technology. People still try to live as they did before the blackout but now they have to worry about warlords and militia that have taken over most areas. The show focuses on the Matheson family, who hold an item that will explain what happened fifteen years ago as well as reverse the effects of the blackout, but they must keep it from the warlords who want to possess that power to rule the world.
The pilot of Revolution was directed by Jon Favreau (Iron Man) and I think he did a commendable job with the show’s first episode. What the show gets right really works but it definitely has plenty of pratfalls as well. One thing that Revolution does well is how it makes the world look after fifteen years without power. Everything looks gritty; the grass is almost as high as most houses and all the effects on city buildings looks great. However, only a few of the performances worked here; Billy Burke (Twilight) seems to be the lead and he does a good job throughout the first episode. Zac Orth (Vicky Christina Barcelona) provides the comic relief on the show and is actually pretty funny. At first his character seemed a little cheesy but as it went on he became more likable.
The best performance on the show comes from Giancarlo Esposito who plays the captain of the Monroe Republic militia. Hot off his stint as Gus Fring on AMC’s Breaking Bad, Esposito once again proves that he can play a menacing villain better than anyone else on TV. Elsewhere on the show the performances range from bad to mediocre. Tracy Spiridakos plays the niece of Billy Burke’s character and her performance is by far one of the worst on the show. It’s not that she’s flat out bad but for her to be one of the major characters she really needs to bring a lot more to the character. Elizabeth Mitchell (Lost) and Tim Guinee (Iron Man) show up for a little while and both do fine but you wish their characters would stick around for a little longer.
After watching the pilot episode, Revolution looks like another show that’s trying to capitalize on the success of Lost. Ever since Lost became popular networks have been trying to put out shows that have a mystery surrounding the entire plot. So far it hasn’t worked on shows such as The Event, Alcatraz and FlashForward and right now Revolution looks like it could go the way of those shows. The overall mystery is interesting but it’s more of a character driven show and unless they flesh out the characters a little more I don’t see this one lasting more than one season. Hopefully they can manage to keep it interesting for the rest of this first season and as long as they do I’ll be sure to stick around.
Revolution is set to begin airing on NBC on Monday, September 17th.
Jake Peffer
Originally published September 7, 2012. Updated April 10, 2018.
