Reviews

Seriously tho, it's just a good little thriller. The bad guys are very heinous. The good guys are very good. It doesn't spend a lot of time with the back story of why they're after the good guys and that's ok. We get it. Whistle blower = good guy. Hit men = bad guys. Are there plot holes? A few. Do we care? Nope because there is Angelina Jolie emoting as a firefighter struggling with a terrible trauma who you know will cross paths with the good guys and somehow save them. You know she will face a big fire. You know she will overcome her trauma in the end. All is right in the world. I just hope the horse escaped the fire.

If you're going to make an episode where there's a coven of Wiccans you probably ought to talk to some Wiccans before writing the script. It was full of urban legends and nonsense. If they think no Wiccans ever use psychedelics, they have another think coming. We also don't go throwing rye flour around. Booth's disgusting remark that "you never get to see the ones you'd want to see naked" was sexist, ageist, and just inappropriately nasty.

I love this show but this episode was so bad. Another glaring error is that elderly bones do not get green stick fractures. Only the bones of children and young adults do.

Poor Jane Austin is rolling in her grave.

Season 1: What started out as relatively charming is ruined by an over crowded storyline with as jumbled a mishmash as they could manage, lifting storylines intact from other Jane Austin novels and making them worse. No social norms are observed. Young ladies alone with men, running off with few or no consequences, no chaperones in sight, ever, young ladies calling other ladies and gentlemen they're not connected to (or have even interacted with at any point in the story) by family ties by their first names and vice versa. Remembering to bow and curtesy forgotten 99% of the time. Our main character so abused the hospitality of her hosts so egregiously, she'd have been sent home in disgrace yet she's never even admonished. I keep watching because of the horror of the thing is kind of magnetic. Let's not forget the shades of incest and graphic sex without nudity. In a Jane Austin story. A Jane Austin story. Everything has to have graphic sex these days.

Season 2: Our leading man does not return in a ridiculous turn of events that erase his sacrifice in season 1. A RADICAL shift of character for one gentleman from a slightly silly hypochondriac drunkard into a much more stable, and obliquely gay character. He was my favorite part of season 1. Gotta tick that box tho. Of course everyone is trying to push marriage on both young female leads who want to be modern independent women so unlike any Austin heroine. They're overly bold with total strangers, obnoxious, and rude. Our lead, against all normal behaviors, hares off into the plot of Jane Ayre, again against the wishes of her hosts and without consulting her father, a thing that would lead to social disaster for both families with no thought of the consequences despite having them pointed out to her, but hey ho... let's just make up the rules as we go along. Apparently the writers got their novelists mixed up. Meanwhile, the entire plot is also incorporating parts of Pride and Prejudice. And the incest siblings are back so character development is moving backwards as a redemption arc is destroyed. Meanwhile, we have a cousin pregnant by the brother turning up in episode 3.

What an unholy mess. I'm basically hate watching at this point. I'm sure it will come out rosy in the end because our main character, by her divine power of being a pretty and rude young lady melts hearts and fixes every problem... except the poor young architect whose heart she stole and trampled in season 1.

Heard about this in a list of expensive flops. The writing is terrible, the regular cast are terrible from what I've seen- surprising since I love Robert Alda but he's barely in the pilot. It's incredibly cheesy and cringy. Don't get me wrong, I love/hate this and hope to find more episodes.

However! Just in the pilot there is a massive amount of overt racism and sexism unusual for tv shows of this period. All the main cast except one person are white. The non-white member is the head Porter. All but one Porter you see is black. He always pops up at the right moment to bring in the next prop or push a plot device. He's always grinning and jive talking and the jokes are awful. Not sure what happened here because this is the same guy who did Love Boat. Most female staff on this train wear midriff tops and silver hot pants. The men wear normal uniforms. Except the people in the gym who wear leotards. The guy who runs the gym is so stupid it's unbelievable that he could feed himself let alone have any position like this. While I like the cheesiness of this, I really can't get around the racism.

Steve Lawrence holds the plot of the pilot episode. He's the only decent actor in the cast. It's honestly shocking. Other very famous cast members are little more than caricatures seen occasionally in bits that don't forward them plot. Almost all of the male characters are bombastic idiots, cruel wife abusers, or fools.

I'm 61 and had a non debilitating stroke. Nobody put me in a nursing home or even suggested it even tho I was having serious mental health issues in the beginning. You can't see dementia on an MRI. You CAN see Parkinson's on an MRI and do you know what happens when you have a stroke? LOTS of brain scans. If she had Parkinson's it would have showed on those scans. Parkinson's dementia doesn't come first before the observable symptoms. Who doesn't know these things? Dementia is only an observed and testable issue. This woman has no symptoms of Parkinson's disease. You can't be forced to take medication against your will. You can't be confined against your will. You can leave any time whether the doctor suggests it or not unless you're confined by a court. Her daughter does not have medical power of attorney. All of this is ridiculously distracting from the get go.

The performances are good. The chemistry between the grandmother and grandson is amazing. I love all the residents of the home. The daughter is absolutely hateful. All great performances.

Most of the staff, however, come off as evil from the start. In a senior home that expensive, they'd have the veneer of caring. They'd be placating. I think of it were not for bad directing and the main character issues I mentioned earlier it would have been much better. They could have had some actual reason for her to be there.

On the whole, disappointing only because of poor writing premise.

Spoiler Alert!!

I previously reviewed this during the first season. Now in the third season it's gotten all bizarrely Christian and evil cults trying to kill the heroes of the tale. It's taking the exact road that Lost took but giving you the spoiler end well ahead of time. It's gotten lost in its own plot. I think the actors are even confused on where this is going.

Take aways:

1. God cares about the 190 something people on this plane enough to raise them from the dead after four plus years but they can only live that much time and have to jump through obscure hoops every day.

2. God gives them inexplicable visions they have to act on to save people but they have to figure them out like a box mystery..

3. If you don't believe in the Christian god, you're basically screwed.

4. Atheists turn Christian when something they can't explain happens.

5. Everyone wants to kill them because Jesus.

6. The government is evil and doesn't care if they kill children by experimenting on them. (Probably true but they're banging you over the head with it.)

7. Non-police officers can walk into the station and demand something and the police acquiesce.

8. The police won't shoot you or even arrest you for crimes if you're from a magic plane especially if you're white.

9. Nobody has to work to live in really nice homes. Except the one doctor who never leaves work because she's Indian.

10. This story has gone way too far into fantasy realms without making any sense.

Cons first:

The main family starts off owing a massive amount of money to the insurance company which is taking them to court to get the payout back. (apparently nobody else has this issue) and decide they can make payments based on the wife's catering business she never works in or even appears to go to at all and her husband's getting a job he never gets. Nobody ever goes to work but the detective who doesn't actually do her job 99.9% of the time. They all have great lifestyles but never work.

Some characters switch personality from episode to episode. Characters disappear without ever being mentioned again. There is a number of catatonic passengers somewhere with nobody attending to them.

There is the typical government cabal which is completely unnecessary to the story which would he so improved without it.

Im still watching and have no idea if it will get better or worse but I can't imagine how it managed so many seasons. There are so many plot holes and flaws of logic it's hard to imagine they can fix that.

These are all to frequent reasons that I don't often watch network tv series.

Pros:

I like most of the relationships. Most of the characters have great chemistry. There are two characters who have zero chemistry with anyone but otherwise I like the cast.

Almost all the plots involving "callings" are really interesting and there is some great dramatic tension. These are the things that bring me back.

Fantastic cast. Great storytelling. I don't know if it's just me or everyone, I detest the lead female character. Absolutely detest her. The actress is that good in the role. She destroys so many lives in her quest for revenge. Whether he was who she thought he was or not, the killer confessed and served his time. It's appalling that people can be able to dox others. And a second innocent person was nearly murdered with no consequences to the person who was interrupted at the last second.

She's a terrible person. It doesn't matter what anyone else did, her actions were evil and nearly got 2 people killed.

It has a lot of things I like. A great cast. Great music. Great atmosphere. Great suspense.

But the drama is based around a fairly dumb accident that occurs because someone was accidentally aboard through no fault of his own. They discover him 12 hours in but say they can't go back, yet they think they can get to Mars. What?

The primary life support unit/CO2 scrubber is damaged beyond repair. Wait, what? They only have one? No redundancy? Apollo 13 solved this problem but apparently in the future they don't know how to fix this or to bring a spare?

The dilemma comes from the ground crew who tells the captain that she needs to throw the stowaway off the ship in space. Two of them decide that's a great idea. Only the third person wants to give it a chance to find an alternative solution.

I'm only half way through and my mind is boggled on how such a great cast is doing everything they can with a terrible script.