The Passage (Mondays at 9:00 on Fox)
I must be the one person on the internet who didn't read a single word of Justin Cronin's The Passage trilogy, because every review of the new Fox adaptation of the books has stated how much has changed (obviously) in the transfer to the small screen. But I don't know about any of that, so if you don't give a shit about how watered down the material may be and just want to know if the show itself is worth watching, click through. (Hint: It ain't that bad.)
Basically The Passage, if you didn't glean any of this from the supremely generic promos, is a vampire story. I guess everyone who read the books knew that, and since vampires are pretty much over in pop culture, Fox wanted to stray from making that obvious in the previews and commercials. Whatever. These are vampires who everyone refuses to (and there's even a line addressing this in the pilot) call "vampires." Vampirism is a virus turning people into primal, dangerous, creepy as fuck creatures with paper-thin skin and mind control powers. The subjects exposed to the virus are kept at Project Noah to be studied, as these people, nearly all sociopaths or murderers who now have blood thirst, have demonstrated aversion to disease. When the doctors realize the younger, the better, they send their federal agent flunkies out to kidnap a motherless child, Amy (Saniyya Sidney, American Horror Story: Roanoke). But Brad Wolgast (Mark Paul Gosselaar), a grieving war vet who lost his daughter and his marriage, can't do it, so he and Amy go on the run.
There's a lot of plot in this first episode, and it gets exhausting quickly. We learn Brad's history, his connection to Clark (Boardwalk Empire's Vincent Piazza), another agent with seemingly fewer morals, and then to top it off, we meet his ex-wife (Emmanuelle Chriqui) via phone call. We see Amy's mom die, then we see her placed in a foster home, where Brad and another agent find her. We go into the personal lives of Clark and Dr. Sykes (Caroline Chikezie, The Shannara Chronicles); we get a flashback to how Dr. Fanning (Jamie McShane) contracted the virus and a few scenes of his new vampiric powers. And that's all in about 43 minutes. It's a seemingly endless dumping of information, new characters (some of whom we haven't even met yet or who barely got any screen time but will be critical going forward), relationships, and locations. Blink and you've missed something.
But aside from that, The Passage is fairly enjoyable. It's not must-see TV by any means, but it's definitely okay. The bond between Brad and Amy happens a little too quickly to ring true, but Gosselaar has perfect, adorable chemistry with Sydney, a precocious and endearing screen presence who cleanly walks away with the episode. She is feisty and sweet and heartbreaking when the script calls for it, which is great news going forward, since her character is going to be our central figure and eventual heroine. McShane is delightfully creepy as the classic-rock loving Hell monster, and Piazza brings an unexpected sadness to his portrayal of Clark. It's a uniformly great cast.
The material, however, isn't stellar. It's very much in the Buffy vein of the Chosen One mixed with any road trip film where someone's on the run. Brad's past is not unique. The vampires aren't new or exciting (but, I'll say it again, McShane is nightmarish), except for the angle that by potentially making something akin to a flu shot with the vampire virus the human race could be saved. But even the idea of mixing science with monsters is as old as the horror film genre. The relationship between Brad and Amy is the pilot's strongest suit, and more focus on them would be welcome. Because all the distractions and pyrotechnics of the vampire story (gore, hallucinations) and the secret-government-operation story (shootouts, hidden passageways in a base that looks a lot like the mutant school in X-Men) are less effective than their simple, human story.
But even when too much is being shoved into too few scenes, The Passage manages to be easy viewing. It doesn't require much attention or thought or patience, since every scene is a pay-off of some kind. Sometimes easy digestibility is just what an audience needs in its genre television, especially in the winter when days are short and nights are cold and the couch is so inviting.
Comments
Post a Comment