The Event

The main “event” around here lately is that this website was down for two days while we switched servers. Apparently there were issues with the process. I’m not convinced everything is back to normal yet, so let me know if you experience problems.

There was also a TV show that premiered last night called The Event. I watched it. It intrigued me enough to keep watching, but I’m still annoyed about the failures of the last few sci-fi tinged shows that were cancelled … Heroes, Journeyman, FlashForward, etc. … and I’m wary about getting involved in another one only to have it pulled out from under me.

Minor spoilers and a major guess follow.

The gimmick in The Event is that it is told (at least in the pilot) by jumping around a character’s timeline. For example, we start in the present with Sean on a plane being chased by what appears to be the government, and then pulling a gun, apparently hijacking the plane. Right after he pulls the gun we jump back to 23 minutes earlier, and shortly thereafter to 11 or 13 days before that. Then it’s back to the present, but from a different character’s perspective, and we jump through his backstory as well.

We’re introduced to about 6 or 7 main characters in the episode ranging from “everyman” Sean to the President of the United States, some apparently covert military personnel, and military prisoners who have been held for years in Alaska. The prisoners seem to know about the coming “event” but don’t want anyone in power to know.

There is a sci-fi component to the show that isn’t obvious until the end of the episode. There is no evidence one way or the other at this point, but I’m going to guess that the element is time travel and that the prisoners are the travelers. It fits with the gimmick of telling the narrative by jumping around the timeline for each character, and it could explain how the prisoners seem to know something is coming. Frankly, I hope I’m right. I don’t think the show will be nearly as interesting if it turns out to be aliens or something like that. And if it is time travel, that still leaves the door open for plenty of surprises.

I do hope they cut back significantly on the narrative format of jumping around the timeline, though. It worked for the pilot, but I think jumping around as much as they did here would get seriously annoying week to week. I can take a couple of jumps per episode, but 8 or more in a half-hour is getting excessive.

Did you see the premiere? What did you think? Does it earn a spot in your viewing queue? What new or returning shows are you most looking forward to? (For me, it’s Smallville’s final season. I’m a bit of a junkie.)

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