Pilot Roundup Part 4: Whitney, Charlie’s Angels, Pan Am
Whitney
- I’ve talked a lot about how difficult it is to judge a comedy based solely on its pilot. Most shows are moderately funny, so you really have to look at the characters to see if it’ll last. Looking at Whitney, however, you don’t even have to look that far. This show is funny in the worst way - it’s so unfunny, I didn’t even laugh at how bad it is.
- There’s a scene very early in the pilot where Whitney comes out in a white dress to go to a friend’s wedding. Her boyfriend, Alex, says, without a hint of irony, “You can’t wear white to a wedding!” (I may be wrong on the wording - I erased it off of my DVR before the episode was over.) Whitney goes back and changes, and the usual jokes and problems continue. The entire scene smacks so much of usual, constructed sitcom crap it’s unbearable. I was looking forward to Whitney - 2 whole hours of good comedy! - but my hopes were dashed within the first few minutes.
- There are hints of something in the show that could be successful. Whitney makes a few lines that tell a little bit about her character, and I enjoy Chris D’Elia enough as the boyfriend. They don’t seem too unpleasant to spend 22 minutes with. But the show, in its basest level, just isn’t funny, and it’s not something that’s going to improve that drastically.
- Whitney almost seems like a throwback. The three shows that come before in NBC’s block are all defiantly new-age comedies, and Whitney, with the audience (even saying it was filmed before a studio audience) and the style of joke, just seems old. Maybe 10 years ago it may have worked better - and by that, I mean maybe it wouldn’t seem this bad. Considering the way the sitcom has evolved, the second half - where Whitney puts on a sexy nurse costume and then Alex gets hurt and they go to the hospital - seems positively anachronistic.
Charlie’s Angels
- Unfortunately, I can’t say much for this one either. I don’t mean it’s bad - I mean, again, it’s so bad I’m not sure what to say, other than to avoid it at all costs. Shows like this and Whitney have been made for years, and better. This is a terrible, terrible pilot, a show that fundamentally misunderstands its purpose and is boring.
- I actually watched an episode of the original just before this one aired - a coincidence, as I was flipping around waiting for Community to come on. The episode was really not good, even by contemporary standards, but it wasn’t serious. If I believe one thing as a critic, to take something terrible (Charlie’s Angels) and make it fun-terrible (this isn’t a perfect example, but see below), take away the seriousness. Understand you’re making a terrible, campy, fun show, and do it. Understand critics will say the show is awful, and understand those same critics will watch it just because it’s fun to watch. Fun isn’t always on a critical level - it’s usually on a primeval impulse more than anything.
- But in this episode, there’s a child sex trafficking ring and a speech on how terrible those are. The worst moment was when one of the angels die, and then the remaining angels (and sexy Bosley) all talk about what happened, what they think, what she meant to them, and then hug. ALL AT THE SCENE, WHILE THE CAR IS BURNING BEHIND THEM. Not only is it not moving, it’s just so wrong-headed in every way. That scene alone would make this the worst pilot of the fall.
- I told you earlier to avoid Unforgettable, which is just lazy. But at least it understands what it is. It is a boring CBS procedural based on a concept done a million times before. It is ridiculous. But there are no illusions - it is what it is, and that’s it. I’m not going to disparage John Grisham for not being John Steinbeck.
- This, however, has those moments of fake gravitas preceding a scene where they sneak into a party and give party girls laxatives. When trying to find a security camera into a hotel room, they find an angle (in it’s fuzzy green HD) WITH A VIEW OF THE WINDOW, with a perfect view of the girl they’re looking for. This is played straight as an arrow, although the laxative scene has some wacky music behind it. There’s just no fun here, and that’s the worst thing I can possibly say about a show like this.
- Also, the editing, god, the editing. I had a conversation with someone regarding The King’s Speech, and how I found the directing/cinematography/editing a little distracting. I take that back. God, I take it back.
- Not that this really matters, but the acting is terrible too. The angels know this show is terrible, but they don’t have any fun with it. This is the Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen of the Fall 2011 Pilot season - a complete failure on every level.
- I was amazed at how bad this was and had to make sure, and the AV Club nailed it, hilariously. Just because I know I’ll copy Todd’s jokes if I go further, here you go.
Pan Am
- One of the subplots - it turns out, I guess, to be the main plot - involves a stewardess switching a man’s passport to help the CIA. It’s just thrown into the first 20 minutes of the episode, and I didn’t really have any compelling interest in any of the characters. Why, then, was I kind of nervous for the stewardess?
- Welcome to Pan Am, or How Far You Can Go In The Other Direction. Whereas a lot of shows take themselves too seriously and ruin their silly plots, Pan Am goes for the full shine of fun and pretty colors. If Pan Am was still around, I would’ve thought this was a full-length commercial. Things are so perky and cheerful, especially the way the logo is thrown around, that the bad parts of being a woman in 1963 are kind of forgotten. This isn’t totally a bad thing - I think we could use some upbeat dramas - but it came across a little too much like a propaganda piece rather than a creative statement.
- Still, this is a solid pilot - not great, but definitely watchable. The stewardesses are front and center, and they’re all still pretty broadly drawn (the accidental mistress, for example), but everything is fairly well done. Take Christina Ricci’s Maggie - she briefly makes a Hegel reference and is “grounded” because she wouldn’t wear the required girdle. Her boyfriend is a Village writer. It’s not groundbreaking characterization, but it’s good enough, especially when there’s so much going on.
- I did find a lot distracting, including the glossy shine I mentioned earlier. But the flashbacks were the most problematic for me. They seemed way too quick, for one. Maybe I’m used to Lost, but I like a little more time to get to know a situation - between the botched wedding, the traveling, the Bay of Pigs and the engagement stuff, there was a lot going on - and that was only in the flashbacks. On the plane, there’s the mistress subplot, the spy plot, the missing fiancée issue, the Life cover, and a few other things. This is without getting to know characters, the timeframe, etc. Basically, there was so much going on, nothing got time to stand out and make much of an impact. Part of this is in the design - this show should be fast-paced (unlike another 60s drama). But I can see by the end of this season or even later that too much would be going on, and the episodes would be a little disorienting just because of all the plots. Character work is needed, and it’s tough to get if there are 400 plots and 12 flashbacks every episode.
- Part of this is Pan Am needs to figure out its structure - will every episode have a flashback? Will some be character-centric, or will all flashback episodes be about multiple characters? The biggest question with the flashbacks: why are the flashbacks necessary? Is it just for exposition dumps? Are you trying to create a contrast between present day and the past? I have no idea, at this point, and I think the best course of action is for the show to experiment and figure out what works.
- A lot of the dialogue was cringe-worthy, of course. The “take flight” line was supposed to be the big, rousing statement of the pilot - when you try and write a big, rousing statement, you always fail. When subtext turns into text, as it often did in the pilot, it comes across as terrible and hacky. There weren’t many subtle moments, but there were enough. This isn’t a Lost or Mad Men pilot, but it’s perfectly okay for right now.
- The male cast was not very interesting. You have The Good Guy and The Chauvinist Pig We Kind Of Like. This isn’t a real big problem, but it’s kind of refreshing to see the women be the center.
- As far as the moral center goes - I had a problem with Playboy Club’s - it’s okay right now. The show’s main point is that they got to travel the world and get money in return for being objectified, which is okay. Playboy pretty much said they were equals, which was ridiculous. I think this is still definitely revisionist, but it’s not wrong-headed.
- As I said earlier, though, the most important thing is there’s a sense of playfulness about this pilot. The girls aren’t feminist crusaders; the spy isn’t gravely going about her missions; the accidental mistress isn’t crying about the injustices in the world. There’s some darkness underneath the surface, but the honeymooning couple, making out, wanting a bottle of champagne perhaps sum it up best. They’re having fun for the moment - who cares about tomorrow?
