Eleventh Hour: Cardiac
By fred | October 17, 2008
(S01E02) The pilot didn’t really impressed me, far from it actually, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t come back. Not just cause I’m a TVoholic but also because one episode really isn’t enough to judge a show. So here I was, ready for more. That being said, I still remembered the pilot episode and I knew what I was getting into, read I wasn’t expecting anything great, or even really good to be honest.
During the pilot, many things didn’t work for me, many of which I also assumed were only there because it was, a pilot. So there was a need to introduce all characters and their relationship, there was a need to do many things even if they felt forced at times, just because it’s a pilot and there’s a tendency to overdo things and pack too much during such episode.
I went into this new episode expecting something different than last week, and still not expecting much, which is probably why I wasn’t disappointed per-se by the episode. Something was clearly different than last week: last week the bad guys were known from the start, there was a clear match of them between Hood, a fight us which we were the witness.
This time, it was a mystery, the killer was unknown to Hood as to us, and I liked that it wasn’t too predictable, as well as the fact that they didn’t always go back and forth to the same four people because they were always finding out new information, or that they lied, only to eventually catch the bad guy. Always a new theory or suspect kept popping up, and they couldn’t go back to previous suspect because all of them kept dying one after the other, and while it wasn’t too hard to see who the killer actually was it wasn’t obvious either, and it took long enough to get there.
I think there was a clear improvement on that part, as well as overall in the way things were handled. Sure, Hood made a little lesson for Young on something like toad-licking even though it’s something she should have known, I mean it’s not really a secret or anything; and his chat about flowers felt more like killing time showing off that he does know stuff, but hey. I also liked that, this time, Hood’s expertise was actually required, unlike last week where anyone should have been able to solve the case.
But that doesn’t mean things were actually good, let’s not jump to conclusion. For starter, while last week Hood was pretty much useless, this time roles were just reversed and it was Young who was completely useless, really. Oh no, wait, we needed her to actually say things like “11 year-old kids don’t just drop dead from heart-attacks” ! Well, thank God she was here then. Good job on her part, too : she’s here to protect and watch over Hood, yet as soon as they are in a public place she stop paying attention to him so he can just walk out and she’s left like a total incompetent bodyguard with on one to protect.
And they keep insisting on doing things that are useless, scenes obviously made only to give the impression that Hood isn’t your usual guy, that he’s odd and unlike anyone else, or to create dramatic effect, but there’s no point. Hood inspecting the ventilation system of the school was a pretty good example of a scene just here for the joke, I guess it was supposed to be funny somewhere, and to make him somewhat eccentric. But in reality, it was useless, just as useless as him pointing out to a grieving mother that her son kept a video journal. The point of that scene ? A mother crying her dead son, because that’s sad, there’s emotion, it’s dramatic, whatever.
And you have to explain something to me : how come there was no trace of the poison in any of the kids’ blood ? Because the genius kid managed to switch samples, all of them, all the time, even from autopsy reports ?? And how is it possible that not one doctor realized that all the different blood sample were actually exactly from the same individual ? Are they all really lousy doctors ? What about the guys from whatever lab Young sent the analysis to be done ? Can’t anyone look at four reports and see they’re all identical ??
In the end, was there was improvements over the pilot, I feel it still wasn’t a very good show. Do you like this episode better than the pilot as well ? Did you think this was actually a good episode ? Have you ever licked some toads ? Wouldn’t you have killed someone too if there was no TV at home ??
Posted in Reviews
Shows: Eleventh Hour
