4400: 1x04
Feb. 21st, 2022 09:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jedi_of_urth posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
tori_reviews4400: 1x04
I know I said I wasn’t going to review every episode from here on out, and it seems kind of weird what I’m going to focus on when there were several good character beats. But, when the show is so focused on being about something, and commenting on thing, it kind of can’t blame me for being more focused on whether those things work than I am on some of the ways it does them.
Because, as far as I’m concerned, this episode proved why the 4400 should be in quarantine/under observation. If the people running the opperation don’t even necessarily believe the 4400 are from other times, then they aren’t inoculating them against diseases. And if they’re carrying said diseases that are mostly wiped out in our time, then there are going to be problems. What if someone is a carrier for the Spanish Flu? The last thing the world needs is a double once in a century pandemic
I guess the thing I will say on the character stuff is it’s really moving too fast. Shanice bringing up that for her everything was two weeks ago, also means that the 4400 have only known each other those two weeks. And yet everyone is very trusting of each other and all these people have already found out about their superpowers.
At least, in this set of the 4400. We’re told that there are other people out on the integration project, but we don’t hear anything about it. If the big wigs were picking people trying to see a problem develop, then it probably worked in one of the 40 camps at least. This is still really bugging me that we’re not given any insight into the other groups out there, and no one seems to care. I’ve said before that if we were with a camp and each camp has no idea what’s going on in the others, and the big wigs actually are keeping things under wraps so that information isn’t scattering, that could be a solid story development.
In most shows, the answer to the reason we follow the main characters is because they’re the people who have things happen to them. If the people we’re following are a subset within a larger group, we probably have some individual or other group that is the center axis and we see people from the main group as they interact with the axis (that’s more or less how the old 4400 works). But here, we’re set up with a subgroup as the main characters, who are not the central axis coming into contact with smaller groups. This gives the impression that the reason we’re following this group is that they’re somehow different, being *the people* that things happen to; only that doesn’t make sense because there at 4200+ other people out there (plus the people in their orbit) who should be in the same boat.
But I also want to come back to the time point. Because people had connections where they were from, and we don’t see that impacting them much now, aside from Shanice because apparently that’s only her role and no one else’s. Plenty of them were probably married and should still feel like they’re married to those people. Or involved or whatever level they were, but two weeks is not enough time for me to buy that they’ve moved on from the people they were just with.
Like the Doc (sorry, I know they said the name several times but it went over my head; also I’m zi from here on, because I’m a little fuzzy on what they were saying about zer being trans; trans-man or trans-woman came through fuzzy for me). Zi did have a significant other, and they were apparently quite involved; the last they did together was fight; I think the Doc should be kind of distracted with the fact that zi will never get to make it up to said significant other.
With the Reverend I kind of buy it; he may have been practically engaged only a couple weeks ago in his POV, but he’s also charismatic and charming and a showman trying to get what he wants. So I don’t necessarily see the flirting as being that he’s so quickly moved on, but that he’s focusing on something else for now and utilizing his personal skill set.
Anyway, the show is kind of getting better, but also not addressing one of my big problems with how it’s structured. And since I’m sure part of that comes from covid restriction, I’m not confident that it will be fixed in enough time for me to stop complaining.
I know I said I wasn’t going to review every episode from here on out, and it seems kind of weird what I’m going to focus on when there were several good character beats. But, when the show is so focused on being about something, and commenting on thing, it kind of can’t blame me for being more focused on whether those things work than I am on some of the ways it does them.
Because, as far as I’m concerned, this episode proved why the 4400 should be in quarantine/under observation. If the people running the opperation don’t even necessarily believe the 4400 are from other times, then they aren’t inoculating them against diseases. And if they’re carrying said diseases that are mostly wiped out in our time, then there are going to be problems. What if someone is a carrier for the Spanish Flu? The last thing the world needs is a double once in a century pandemic
I guess the thing I will say on the character stuff is it’s really moving too fast. Shanice bringing up that for her everything was two weeks ago, also means that the 4400 have only known each other those two weeks. And yet everyone is very trusting of each other and all these people have already found out about their superpowers.
At least, in this set of the 4400. We’re told that there are other people out on the integration project, but we don’t hear anything about it. If the big wigs were picking people trying to see a problem develop, then it probably worked in one of the 40 camps at least. This is still really bugging me that we’re not given any insight into the other groups out there, and no one seems to care. I’ve said before that if we were with a camp and each camp has no idea what’s going on in the others, and the big wigs actually are keeping things under wraps so that information isn’t scattering, that could be a solid story development.
In most shows, the answer to the reason we follow the main characters is because they’re the people who have things happen to them. If the people we’re following are a subset within a larger group, we probably have some individual or other group that is the center axis and we see people from the main group as they interact with the axis (that’s more or less how the old 4400 works). But here, we’re set up with a subgroup as the main characters, who are not the central axis coming into contact with smaller groups. This gives the impression that the reason we’re following this group is that they’re somehow different, being *the people* that things happen to; only that doesn’t make sense because there at 4200+ other people out there (plus the people in their orbit) who should be in the same boat.
But I also want to come back to the time point. Because people had connections where they were from, and we don’t see that impacting them much now, aside from Shanice because apparently that’s only her role and no one else’s. Plenty of them were probably married and should still feel like they’re married to those people. Or involved or whatever level they were, but two weeks is not enough time for me to buy that they’ve moved on from the people they were just with.
Like the Doc (sorry, I know they said the name several times but it went over my head; also I’m zi from here on, because I’m a little fuzzy on what they were saying about zer being trans; trans-man or trans-woman came through fuzzy for me). Zi did have a significant other, and they were apparently quite involved; the last they did together was fight; I think the Doc should be kind of distracted with the fact that zi will never get to make it up to said significant other.
With the Reverend I kind of buy it; he may have been practically engaged only a couple weeks ago in his POV, but he’s also charismatic and charming and a showman trying to get what he wants. So I don’t necessarily see the flirting as being that he’s so quickly moved on, but that he’s focusing on something else for now and utilizing his personal skill set.
Anyway, the show is kind of getting better, but also not addressing one of my big problems with how it’s structured. And since I’m sure part of that comes from covid restriction, I’m not confident that it will be fixed in enough time for me to stop complaining.
