UPDATED 10:16 EDT / SEPTEMBER 28 2015

NEWS

Limitless series one episode one: Limited, but has potential (Spoilers)

The CBS series adaptation of Neil Burger’s 2011 film Limitless is the second in a slew of new sci-fi series coming out this Fall. It follows last week’s desperately disappointing Minority Report premier, that probably should have been made into a cartoon rather than a drama series. In November we’ll get to see the second installment of the highly anticipated The Man in High Castle, which, like Minority Report, was first created in novel form by Philip K. Dick.

The pilot of Limitless starts off with, lo and behold, a chase scene. It seems so often that if someone isn’t dodging bullets within the first few scenes of a thriller these days the creators, or investors, may worry the hoi polloi might lose their attention. Unlike Limitless the film, the television series doesn’t waste much time on character development, except for what seems like a shoehorned  lapse into his family life and sick father of the protagonist. The confounding question of ‘should we take a wonder drug that changes our lives dramatically and could prevent us from ever being normal enough to read the sports section of New York Times or enjoy a pizza night with the boys?’, is not asked. It’s as if Limitless can’t wait to get to the violence, and even when that happens and good friends die, the protagonist gets over it in about eight seconds. The voice-over during scenes such as the murder also seem quite lame, given that losing friends is usually quite a harrowing ordeal.

Can you imagine what it would be like to use your entire brain?

Probably not, but what an interesting story could be written if such a thing should happen to a person. Unfortunately it looks like Limitless is preparing us not for that kind of story. Instead it looks as if we are going to be introduced to another super-heroic cop, a kind of Sherlock Holmes on acid. The protagonist Brian Finch (Jake McDorman) takes the psychotropic NZT and instead of cleansing his doors of perception and revealing some mind-blowing insights into human nature, he performs an electric guitar solo in the park in front of an impressed crowd. He then gets very sick from the comedown, and only when he discovers Bradley Cooper, the original actor from the film Limitless, does it get more interesting. His supply of NZT becomes unlimited, and we then find out the police intend to hire him.

Bradley’s scene with McDorman is encouraging, and what will likely turn into a romance with the cop who lost her dad to NZT is a relationship that is borderline well conceived. A little too much happens in an hour for it not to be. She’s played by Jennifer Carpenter, the young woman who once scared the hell out of us contorting and ripping her nails out in the film The Exorcism of Emily Rose. The cast is solid, and the filming is stylistic. Only the plot seems hurried, as if it were made for impatient viewers.

Just another cop show

Similar to Minority Report the TV series, it looks like we are looking at yet another super-cop series and a lot of chases around parking lots. This is unfortunate, as the idea, as with Minority Report, is thought-provoking. As William Blake, Aldous Huxley, and Philip K. Dick mulled over quite a lot in their original stories, what remarkable, or terrifying things might happen if we were able to explore the territory in the antipodes of our mind.

The film Limitless at least explored how we might use such a power in selfish or destructive ways. It’s also worth mentioning that if a bunch of folks in the same area can get their hands on NZT why isn’t available around the world, or at least in Idaho? And, what would be the ramifications of worldwide super-brains that can cure illness in heartbeat and see through the machinations of political chicanery, etc? Maybe that’s asking too much, nonetheless, the series should ask a little more.

If it remains just a crime series and doesn’t give us a more profound experience it will likely lose viewers quickly. Car chases, super-cops — they are everywhere on TV, and don’t have much longevity without superior script writing. But the cast is strong, and it’s technically well made. There is potential. The writers will just have to make us care about the characters. The plot, that will have to considerably thicken, preferably on a low flame.

Photo Credit: CBS

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