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fenchurchOkay, so I'm evil... A copy of the pilot for "Jake 2.0" recently found its way into my possession, and I gleefully watched it -- while I don't care for spoilers as a general rule (except when they pertain to Spike on BtVS), I love getting to see things early.
I wasn't expecting much from it really, mostly because the
premise sounded like it could turn silly (when I first read about it, I had bad flashbacks of "Automan" and "Manimal" for some reason). If you haven't heard...
the idea is that a hardware/software tech support geek working for
the NSA accidentally gets infected with nanites which then give him
all sorts of superhero-type abilities. Good premise, but television
doesn't have a fantastic track record for understanding and using
good premises.
I have no clue who wrote the Pilot (there were no opening credits),
but the writing was smart and funny (and not in a slapstick way),
and they actually managed to pull off the characterization as "real"
rather than simply stereotyped. Christopher Gorham is well cast as
Jake Foley -- he's cute, but not over-blown Hollywood handsome, and
does a great job of acting like a successful, adult geek. (Speaking
as a geek, it gets incredibly frustrating to watch Hollywood get it
wrong over and over again, so this was quite a relief.)
They kept the tech references generic enough to not be glaring if
they got it wrong, and made the advanced tech just advanced enough
to not need much of a real world explanation. If you're deeply into the cutting edge, it might make you cringe, but this geek was pleasantly surprised. Here's hoping they can keep it up.
There was one point where I thought they fell down a bit on the exposition -- when Jake
is suddenly able to interface remotely with computer systems. At
one point earlier in the episode, Jake mentions to another character
that everything is going wireless and repeats the sentiment later
after discovering this new ability, but it was one time when I
thought they did need to include some explanation for how the
nanites were able to achieve that sort of access.
As far as characters go, they've got (aside from Jake):
The Wacky Geek Roommate (also done well with characterization) --
one of Jake's old co-workers from Tech Support.
Potential Love Interest #1 -- the unattainable girl from college whose father did top secret work and is
missing (or dead... I don't think it was very clear), who now works for a Senator, and who is
investigating off-the-books funding of projects in the agency where
Jake works (very possibly his new project in particular).
Potential Love Interest #2 -- slightly geeky doctor who has been
working on the nanotechnology project now infecting Jake.
Agency Controller/Partner -- Nice guy who got taken off field work
after having his cover blown, but would love to get back in.
Agency hard-ass -- the boss of the division where Jake now works.
Possibly has some past relationship with the Agency
Controller/Partner.
Laugh Out Loud Line of the episode: "He thinks Equal Opportunity is something
you put in your coffee."
They've got a good setup with story and characters. Sadly, I think
it's doomed to failure because of the incredibly stupid timeslot UPN
is sticking it in -- opposite AtS. It always boggles my mind when network muckymucks schedule a genre show to compete with another genre show... no matter what that genre happens to be. They never seem to grasp that there's a finite number of viewers for any given genre, and they'd do better in the numbers in another time slot where they can then have the same exact audience as the show they wind up competing against. Or maybe I'm just too ignorant to understand the subtleties of their cleverness. ;-)
I wasn't expecting much from it really, mostly because the
premise sounded like it could turn silly (when I first read about it, I had bad flashbacks of "Automan" and "Manimal" for some reason). If you haven't heard...
the idea is that a hardware/software tech support geek working for
the NSA accidentally gets infected with nanites which then give him
all sorts of superhero-type abilities. Good premise, but television
doesn't have a fantastic track record for understanding and using
good premises.
I have no clue who wrote the Pilot (there were no opening credits),
but the writing was smart and funny (and not in a slapstick way),
and they actually managed to pull off the characterization as "real"
rather than simply stereotyped. Christopher Gorham is well cast as
Jake Foley -- he's cute, but not over-blown Hollywood handsome, and
does a great job of acting like a successful, adult geek. (Speaking
as a geek, it gets incredibly frustrating to watch Hollywood get it
wrong over and over again, so this was quite a relief.)
They kept the tech references generic enough to not be glaring if
they got it wrong, and made the advanced tech just advanced enough
to not need much of a real world explanation. If you're deeply into the cutting edge, it might make you cringe, but this geek was pleasantly surprised. Here's hoping they can keep it up.
There was one point where I thought they fell down a bit on the exposition -- when Jake
is suddenly able to interface remotely with computer systems. At
one point earlier in the episode, Jake mentions to another character
that everything is going wireless and repeats the sentiment later
after discovering this new ability, but it was one time when I
thought they did need to include some explanation for how the
nanites were able to achieve that sort of access.
As far as characters go, they've got (aside from Jake):
The Wacky Geek Roommate (also done well with characterization) --
one of Jake's old co-workers from Tech Support.
Potential Love Interest #1 -- the unattainable girl from college whose father did top secret work and is
missing (or dead... I don't think it was very clear), who now works for a Senator, and who is
investigating off-the-books funding of projects in the agency where
Jake works (very possibly his new project in particular).
Potential Love Interest #2 -- slightly geeky doctor who has been
working on the nanotechnology project now infecting Jake.
Agency Controller/Partner -- Nice guy who got taken off field work
after having his cover blown, but would love to get back in.
Agency hard-ass -- the boss of the division where Jake now works.
Possibly has some past relationship with the Agency
Controller/Partner.
Laugh Out Loud Line of the episode: "He thinks Equal Opportunity is something
you put in your coffee."
They've got a good setup with story and characters. Sadly, I think
it's doomed to failure because of the incredibly stupid timeslot UPN
is sticking it in -- opposite AtS. It always boggles my mind when network muckymucks schedule a genre show to compete with another genre show... no matter what that genre happens to be. They never seem to grasp that there's a finite number of viewers for any given genre, and they'd do better in the numbers in another time slot where they can then have the same exact audience as the show they wind up competing against. Or maybe I'm just too ignorant to understand the subtleties of their cleverness. ;-)
