The Following - Series Premiere - Recap and Review - Pilot
Recap and review of The Following - Series Premiere - Pilot:
There's a very thin line a show can tread when it's on network television. You can tell a violent story or a highly-sexualized story, or even an unsettling, disturbing story (as evidenced by your average episode of procedurals like Law & Order: SVU). The extent to which sex and violence are tolerated on NBC, FOX, CBS, ABC, and The CW has as much to do with the network as it does with FCC guidelines. You're more likely to see a show like The Following on FOX than you are on ABC, and I imagine that it has a lot to do with the ideology of the network itself. FOX doesn't seem to be that scared to put all its goods on the glass, so to speak, or to get provocative and prurient to an extent that other networks probably wouldn't. Maybe it's because they're currently sitting in last place among the major networks, so they feel they have nothing to lose. In this sense, The Following will get them attention. I just can't be sure it'll be the good kind. But you know what they say: there's no such thing as bad press.
Credit: FOX
FOX sent out four episodes to critics for review, and having seen all four that FOX sent, The Following strikes me as one of the boldest shows on network television in years, though not necessarily because it's narratively ambitious. There's an oppressive sense of dread that makes each episode as tense as it is bleak - because, make no mistake about it, this show is frightfully bleak. Of course, it's kind of hard to have a sense of optimism about a show in which a serial killer has inspired a cult of followers to replicate his infamous slayings, in which the eyes of the victims are ritually removed and the words "Nevermore" are scrawled in blood over the body as part of some macabre homage to Edgar Allen Poe. Part of what makes the show so unlike anything on TV right now is in the sleek framing of each shot, and the lighting effects that essentially turn a procedural crime drama into the best horror series on network television. Yes, there are jump scares, but the difference is that, in most current horror movies in recent years, a jump scare usually amounts to a tease. The thing that's startling us rarely ever turns out to be something we should be afraid of. It's just a cat, or a shadow, or a friendly neighbor coming over to check in on us. Yet here, especially in subsequent episodes following tonight's premiere, the jump scares are actually the menace that the victim is dreading. There's death lurking around every corner, and the show really doesn't skimp out on the violence. It's no exaggeration to say that this is one of the most profoundly disturbing series in recent network history, as I can't remember many other series that have had a crazed woman gouging her eyes out with an ice pick, or a victim describing how she tried to sever her own artery after being stabbed so she would bleed out quicker and have the miserable business of dying over with.
But I'm burying the lede a bit here. Let's talk about the actual story, and what does and doesn't work.
Credit: FOX
Ryan Hardy (Kevin Bacon) is a retired Federal Agent drawn back into the nightmare when Joe Carroll (James Purefot), a death row inmate whom Ryan was instrumental in putting behind bars, escapes from prison by slaying a whole control room's worth of prison guards (with the help of a mole, because if television has taught us anything, it's that Brits, with their slick accents and smoothly swarthy looks, are great at seducing others to their cause). Ryan has had a hard time moving on from his life, post-Carroll. He was forcefully retired from field work when his final, climactic confrontation with Carroll resulted in his nearly being killed. A pacemaker is the only thing that keeps him from keeling over, not that he doesn't do damage to his heart everyday from the voluminous amount of alcohol he consumes (stowing away a quarter-handle of vodka in a water bottle on his way to meet with the Feds). Ryan wrote a successful book on his pursuit and capture of Carroll, and this is one of the big motivating factors in the FBI calling him back onto the case, as no one knows Carroll better than Ryan. We know this because people in the FBI headquarters go out of their way to tell him all the time, even while some of the agents in question go out of their way to question his every move. The only real ally he's got is a starry-eyed Agent Mike Weston (Shawn Ashmore), who worships Ryan in a manner not unlike the way Carroll's followers worship him. I would imagine this parallel is not accidental.
Credit: FOX
The narrative jumps back and forth between the present, and various events in the past as far back as 2003, and as recently as 2006. We see how Carroll, a former popular college professor with an Edgar Allen Poe fixation, identified his young victims. Only one victim ever escaped with her life, young Sarah Fuller (Maggie Grace). Much of the episode centers on Sarah's fear of Carroll's inevitable return to finish what he'd started, and Ryan's one-track focus to keep her safe. It's a solid, engaging storyline, the conclusion to which is as shocking as just about anything you'll see on Monday nights. In addition, there are a host of red herrings and subtle hints sprinkled throughout the episode, from the ubiquitous presence of Sarah's gay neighbors (Nico Tortorella and Arian Moayed) to the looming threat of Jordy (Steven Monroe), the prison guard who helped Carroll escape and is looking to continue carrying out his work. There's also the story following the past romance between Ryan and Carroll's ex-wife, Claire Matthews (Natalie Zea), who began a relationship with Hardy during Carroll's trial. She is raising the son she had with Carroll, little Joey (Kyle Catlett), with the help of a young nanny (Valorie Curry) who's more big sister than authority figure. These elements all come together to make a fairly exciting series premiere, with a ton of different twists and turns that keep things fresh and interesting. This is thanks to the presence of Purefoy as the serial killer in question.
Credit: FOX
It would be easy for Carroll to affect a one-dimensional interpretation of a character that isn't all that nuanced, but he goes all-in with his portrayal of a man who is desperate to transform murder into art. His moments with Ryan suggest an all-consuming enmity between the two that does much of the work of the flashbacks without us needing to be told. We can see how Carroll relishes in making Ryan miserable. More disturbingly, he seems to genuinely get off on the actual act of murder, his knife serving as a phallic stand-in, a connection that would be trite if Purefoy's total immersion in the performance didn't render it so effective. His anger seems to stem not merely from Ryan having captured him and ended his reign of terror, but from his sexual jealousy at Ryan having taking his wife from him, ignoring that Claire had already filed for divorce. Purefoy's deliberate, baneful energy informs his scenes with Bacon, who does a tremendous job serving as the emotional center of the series. Sarah was the one person he was able to save from Carroll - And so he's singularly focused on keeping her safe, while also bringing Carroll, and his legion of followers, to justice. Bacon's excellence really can't be overstated here. He keeps the show afloat at moments where its bleakness would threaten to derail the entire enterprise. Ryan Hardy is among the more human cops in recent TV fiction, and it's the desire to see him succeed and bring down Carroll, who himself is a truly compelling figure, that makes this series as compulsively watchable as it turns out to be.
Credit: FOX
Having seen what the next three weeks of this series has to offer, I can confidently say that if you don't enjoy this premiere, you're not going to enjoy the subsequent episodes. Cable has greater leniency in the content it presents, so it isn't surprising that a network show would feel the need to compensate so dramatically by ramping up the violence and dark atmosphere. But I would hope that the show learns that what makes cable dramas so much more successful is their dedication to nuanced storytelling, worldbuilding, and character. The latter, in particularly, will be what sets The Following apart from other network series of its ilk once the shock of its actual content wears off. There's a great series underneath the morass of oppressive bleakness, its unsettling indulgence in human depravity, and the presence of what can often feel like violence for violence's sake. If the show can overcome its salacious, prurient impulses, and develop its characters beyond the surface level of their individual missions, this show could be great. As it stands now, it's merely just good, if occasionally disturbing.
