"Persons Unknown"-WHAT THE FUCK, NBC??

[Big Dick McGee]

Ok, so I'm like one of the last fifteen people in the world who was still watching "Persons Unknown" this summer. It wasn't great, but for a summer series, it was decent, and I was expecting the last 4 or 5 episodes to be typical Christopher McQuarrie goodness. NBC always billed it as a self-contained 13-episode mini-series, and at the end of each episode the voice over would say, "By the end of the summer, all will be revealed!"

This past Saturday, they aired the final two episodes. I was pretty psyched to get the answers I was waiting for, as they had been revealing a lot of stuff the in episodes 8-10. I start watching, and I realize the recap is for an episode, #11, that I never saw. WTF? I know my DVR would have recorded it, so I go online, and lo and behold...NBC decided to skip airing this episode, and only made it available online. WHAT. THE. FUCK?!?!?!

http://tvseriesfinale.com/tv-show/persons-unknown-episode-11-17515/

I mean, it wasn't a huge deal for me, since I have broadband, but given the fact that it's a fucking 13-episode mini-series, which revolves around a conspiracy/mystery, wouldn't NBC figure, I don't know, THE 3RD-TO-LAST EPISODE IS PRETTY IMPORTANT??? They set up the final two episodes with some pretty meaty stuff in episode #11.

So, I muddle through it on LG's laptop, then decide to just go for it and watch the last two. OK, full disclosure, I was perfectly happy with the ending of Lost. I didn't expect all of my burning questions to be answered, but enough of them were resolved that I was more than satisfied. Not so with this show. Quite possibly the WORST series finale in history. I wouldn't have been so upset if they hadn't kept promising "All will be revealed" for 10 weeks, and if I knew it was coming back for a second season. But the finale just made me feel like I wasted my time watching it.

Spoiler

The penultimate episode ended with everyone faking their deaths, and escaping. But by the end of the finale, ALL of the people were back in captivity of "The Program"! The ONLY difference is that Joe was back in a hotel, while the other 6 opened the elevator and were greeted by one of the Program people saying, "Welcome to Level 2", and it was revealed they were on a huge ship in the middle of the ocean. Again, WTF? Why the fuck did I waste my time watching the show, if all the people would end up right back where they started from??

They didn't reveal what "The Program" is, they didn't reveal the purpose of kidnapping all those people, and they introduced Robert Picardo as a special guest...and then never told you who he was. Plus, they put him in a ridiculous wig that came down to his back, and was snow-white.

Meh, I don't know why I'm complaining, since I'm sure NO ONE on this board watched the show, LOL.

 

[Dr Dave]

That is a odd thing to do airing that one episode online only.

 

[Yub]

It's NBC, what did you expect?

 

[Blindgroping]

That is a odd thing to do airing that one episode online only.

No, it was just getting the Heroes treatment.
that and the needed the space for another show.

And BDM, it looks like these people are in a progression. not a Finale, but like 24, next season, they work through Level 2.

 

[Big Dick McGee]

No, it was just getting the Heroes treatment.
that and the needed the space for another show.

And BDM, it looks like these people are in a progression. not a Finale, but like 24, next season, they work through Level 2.

Yeah, but the show was conceived as a mini-series, and it was shot in 2009, so no hope of any more story. My beef is that they kept promsing, "All will be revealed" at the end of each episode, and they revealed very little. Meh.

 

[Donovan]

I lost interest in it pretty quickly. Occasionally I'd catch a few minutes here and there, and I saw what must have been the finale the other night, or the last five minutes of it anyway. I had watched a couple minutes earlier and they (MIB henchmen) were chasing some girl in a hospital, standard action cliche #237, then later I flipped back and it was like a bit from the pilot where they're all back in the lobby. Then there was this really muddled bit where they get in the elevator, and it opens on the lobby with a new blond girl, but then they are not in an elevator but it's a boat on the ocean.

This show tried way to hard to be Lost, but their" mystery swerves" were jarring and confusing as hell without being smart and/or entertaining. Meh.

 

[Big Dick McGee]

^^The blonde girl who was the new Night Manager was one of the original 6, Tori. She disappeared and her dead body was found about midway through the series, to be replaced by BSG's Kandyse McClure. I guess it was supposed to be "shocking" that Tori was alive and now part of the program.

"By the end of summer, all will be revealed" was pretty much a lie.

 

[Donovan]

That's what I mean. Trying way too hard to be all "betcha didn't see THAT coming." Smart writing is smart writing, and if you go for the swerve every single week it isn't smart writing.

Lost wasn't a show about swerves, even though the swerves got all the press. It was about a group of characters, each with a distinct history and "life". The first season spent liberal amounts of time developing those characters through backstories, so that when the swerves DID happen people gave a shit. We didn't care that a polar bear was trying to eat people on a tropical island because it was a polar bear on an island, we cared because it was Sawyer and Kate and Charlie almost getting eaten.

Most shows miss that concept when they try to do knockoffs. If you don't have characters easy to care about, nothing else means shit...

 

[Big Dick McGee]

I had high hopes for the show, and in fact the only reason I started watching was because it was created and written by McQuarrie, who wrote "The Usual Suspects".

 

[Donovan]

Yeah, but that movie was lightning in a bottle. He couldn't recreate that kind of movie magic if he tried I don't think. Even when I watch it over again I think, this movie really shouldn't be as good as it is. Usually about the time Spacey does the "Skokie Illinois" story. I think, well THAT was fucking random.

But the talents of Spacey and the rest of the cast make that movie click on another level and they're able to carry it past clunker moments in the writing. Primarily Spacey, but Baldwin acts his ass off as do the rest of the players.

Once again, it's characters that make the swerves work, not the other way around...