I review the first episode of The 100, The CW’s latest post apocalyptic
drama, starring Eliza Taylor, Paige Turco, Bobby Morley and more.
The
100 is a show that I’ve been meaning to watch
for a while and when I finally got around to it, It did not disappoint. Having
only liked two CW shows out of the many that I’ve watched up until now, Arrow and Supernatural, I wasn’t expecting great things from the series yet
at the same time I did not want to be disappointed. Thankfully, despite some
problems, The 100 is a show that does
prove that it not only has a lot of potential, but also proves to be a very
entertaining show, at least based on what its pilot has provided.
The
100 is a post apocalyptic drama that set 97
years after a devastating Nuclear War that wiped out all life on Earth, with
the only survivors belonging to the residents of the twelve space stations in
Earth Orbit prior to the war, and a handful of “grounders” who managed to
escape to the space stations. Banding together to form a single massive space
station called “The Ark”, it plays host to 2,400 people. However, The Ark is
dying, and time is running out for the people in space. Due to the rarity of resources,
all crimes no matter what they are can be punished by death, unless the guilty
suspect is under 18 years of age. We learn that one hundred imprisoned, teenage
convicts have been declared “expendable” and are sent to the surface in order to
discover whether life on the planet is habitable or not.
The plot is certainly intriguing and has
all the prospects for a great series – think a post apocalyptic Lord of the Flies intended for The Hunger Games market with a good dash
of CW-isms thrown in for good measure. Some of the acting may be weak in places
and the characters look all too clean for people in their current predicament,
meaning that the whole grimdark feel is kind of robbed, which is the same sort
of problem that the recently cancelled series Revolution had. It’s hard to make your show look realistic when all
of your characters look like teenage models in a post apocalyptic setting.
However, I found the cast to be decent.
Nothing too ground breaking here and it fails to meet the acting found in even
other shows on the CW (Arrow & Supernatural specifically) but there is
certainly promise and we all know how shaky of a start Arrow got off to – taking at least half a season before it actually
got any good. However, unlike Arrow and
Supernatural, The 100 casts a lead
female character in the spotlight, Eliza Taylor’s Clarke who’s the daughter of
Dr. Abigail Griffin (Paige Turco) and the deceased Jake Griffin. Having been
arrested because she, like her father – wanted to let the public know that the
Ark was dying, Clarke finds herself heading down to the ground with the other
criminals.
From the start, the show is filled with
exposition, with a scene where the son of the Chancellor (Isaiah Washington),
Wells (Eli Goree), shout at each other about their backstory in a life-or-death
situation being one of the more notable incidents that the show could have done
without. However, most pilots these days tend to have large amounts of
exposition, so I’m hoping that this is something that they can tone down as the
show goes on.
The tone is dramatic and the creators do
their best to make the show grimdark. We get deaths to the 100 before they even
reach Earth, and reviews for future episodes state that we’re not done with the
bloodshed just yet.
There’s a mixture of cast in this show,
both young and old that help leave an impact. As Battlestar Galactica is my favourite show, I loved seeing Alessandro
Juliani (Felix Gaeta) show up as one of the adults aboard the Ark and I hope
that this isn’t the last we’ll see of
his character, and having been informed that there’s more BSG cast appearing on the show in later episodes, I can’t wait.
The various teenagers are also dropped on
us in quick succession. Besides Clarke and Wells, we get Bellamy (Bobby Morley)
and Octavia (Marie Avgeropoulos), the only brother and sister amongst the group
in a world where to have more than one child is punishable by death – Octavia’s
existence having been kept a secret. We get other stereotypes as well, such as a
bad-boy with a heart of gold, Finn (Thomas McDonnell), and a comedic duo Jasper
(Devon Bostick) and Monty (Chris Larkin). With these characters being the main
focus of the group, it’s understandable that we don’t get much attention for
the rest of The 100 just yet.
However, despite the cast, there’s no
really strong character here just yet, nobody quite ready to become everybody’s
favourite character. They don’t make an instant impression, with Clarke, the
series’ lead only having potential at the moment. There’s also the problem of pop
music such as Imagine Dragon’s Radioactive
being played over important moments that are among the several CW-isms at
work here, including the ground-laying for possible romantic triangles to
develop in the future. They could be done without, but despite this, the show
is still relatively strong.
With some solid special effects and a
script and characters with potential, The
100 is off to a solid start. Hopefully the dialogue will improve over time
and the CW-isms will decrease, but for now, I have added another show to my
list of titles that I’m currently watching. It may not be the best thing on TV
but it does at least provide for some entertaining viewing, and the fact that
it’s been renewed for Season 2 has to count for something, right?
VERDICT:
3/5
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