First off, I'm a frickin nerd.
I love disaster movies, I love sci fi twists, I love super heroes, and I love candy. So when I saw that there is this new show called Flashforward coming to ABC, my interest was piqued. With my favorite show of off time, LOST, ending next year, I'm going to need something even remotely like that to keep me going in life as I look for a job and pick cheese doodle dust out of my chest hair whilst relaxing on the couch in the same sweat pants I've worn three days in a row. I had high hopes for the show that seemed like it had a lot of potential.
With that said, I liked the pilot "No More Good Days". It was entertaining, mysterious, fun, and blue. I mean that, there was a blue tint to the entire show. The effects were great, the holy sh*t moments pitch perfect, and the cinematography dead on. The acting was great and I love to see Sonya Walger aka Penny in Lost any day of the week. I thought the baiting gimmicks were disguised nicely and the show has left me curious to know more. But something was off, it took me a second to see it, but I couldn't help but feel like the network was treating me like a baby.
A professor of mine Mike Atkinson and I spoke of Lost once and he said, "It will never happen again. The show is a fluke, a good one, but it will never happen again." I tend to agree with him on this due to the fact that Lost was the first of its kind. A sci fi masked as a prime time drama. Even before the show started there was a huge cult following and I think JJ Abrams can direct better than David Goyer. Blade Trinity ringing a bell here?
ABC is trying to artificially create another Lost with hints to mysteries and online interaction. This just comes off as cheap to me. I got into Lost because of the story, the characters, the acting, and the directing. Flashforward went to commercial and all the strange little hints were brought up by the voice over guy telling us to go to the official website for more clues and answers. I went to said website where I found David Goyer and Brannon Braga talking about these things we "may have missed". I didn't fucking miss anything! I felt degraded. They didn't even give any answers besides what episodes might give us some answers. Lost just let it ride, and let the audience figure things out for themselves.
There was a kangaroo in the episode. Just walking the streets of LA after the blackout. I thought it was a cool little quirky thing but during the commercial I was told to go online and find out more about it. I did and David Goyer said that there is a back story to it that will pan in throughout the season. Like the episode "What Kate Did" it will be like "What the Kangaroo Did". I'm finished with that thought there because there is nothing more to say.
With Dominic Monaghan and Sonya Walger in the show, its almost like ABC is trying to trick people into thinking that this is the next Lost. There is even an Oceanic Airlines billboard at one point. I say, just let the show be a show. If it gets the same kind of following then good for it, it means its a good show. If it doesn't, let it go. They are trying too hard and its obvious.
They say, imitation is the highest form of flattery. In this case, it isn't. I liked the show, but I don't like what they are trying to do. I just hope they calm down in the episodes to come.
