Fear Itself: Community
By fred | July 25, 2008
(S01E07) So last week, while the episode was all the more predictable, and didn’t always make sense, and as such could have end up being pretty boring, as I said then I ended up liking it. I’m not sure why, but something worked and I enjoyed the episode despite knowing what was going to happen all the time and never be any surprise, or scared.
This week it was all the same in that we knew what was going on, what was going to happen, and how things would end. We knew it all, again no surprises along the way, yet there was a big difference with last week’s episode : I was incredibly bored.
And really, when you look at this episode, how could you not be ?
It’s not that it wasn’t well directed, or acted, or that Shiri Appleby isn’t cute, but from the very beginning you know this is going to be the story of the “weird” community with special rules, we have seen this story so many times already, and as usually in Fear Itself here they only do it one more time, without even trying to get something new, to present a new take on that story or shake things up. Nope, none of that, just the usual stuff, so it can only be boring.
And, it should be pointed out I guess that Fear Itself is supposed to be an horror anthology, it even has the word “fear” in its name. And you should try to remember that, when you think about this episode, because it really failed at creating any tension or anything that would really had us worried or scared at any point. Everything that’s supposed to happen, happen, and we never feel like the couple is in any real/immediate danger.
They’re just trying to figure things out, and maybe trying to escape, yet when they get a chance to leave (to go to the hospital) they don’t just drive away never to return, no “they” come back to ensure that they could get sucked back into the community later on, of course. And again, in their pure stupid tradition, they had to come up with a “final twist”, which once again was utterly predictable, I mean who didn’t see that coming?, and also - if that wasn’t enough - that twist once again pretty much don’t make no sense.
I mean, all of a sudden the wife is all accepting the community and willing to do whatever it takes, even having her husband to loose both his legs, and so his the lawyer friend ! This is just BS, comes out of nowhere just for the sake of having a “twist”, and it kinda ruins everything. Given how that “everything” we started with was extremely boring all along the way, in the end we’re not left with much.
By the way, who in his right mind signs a contract like that without even reading it, at all, or get a lawyer to look at it !?? Especially when you best friend just happens to be, a freaking lawyer ! This episode was a perfect rendition of the Fear itself formula : take a well-known story, re-do it without trying anything new or different in any way, just do it by the book, and don’t forget to throw in a “twist” by the end of it, one that everybody saw coming, and preferably that doesn’t make any sense and/or makes the characters’ behavior completely ludicrous.
This episode fails on every level to deliver what I think we were to expect from this show, yet this seems to be true with every episode so far, sadly, so there’s really no reason to be surprised…
Posted in Reviews
Shows: Fear Itself
