Better. Stronger. Faster. BIONIC WOMAN - Pilot Review

Soooo ... who else is excited for the return of one of the best live-action comedies on TV tonight in THE OFFICE? If you like to laugh, and you're not watching, you're an idiot.

Haha, okay, that may be a bit harsh. But, look, I was the biggest doubter of them all at first, as the original British version of The Office still stands as one of the all time greatest comedies ever to air, and the first season of the American Office was little more than a pale shadow of the original. But in Seasons 2 and 3, things took a turn for the hilarious, and Season 4 is set to truly be must-see TV if it can continue the momentum of last season. Plus, once paired with the very funny 30 ROCK, Thursday nights are as funny as they've ever been.

BIONIC WOMAN:

- Okay, let me talk about BIONIC WOMAN. For some reason, there is a ton of hate out there for this show, and I cannot fathom why. I mean, not that the vocal detractors are necessarilly in the majority, seeing as how the show debuted last night as the #1 new show of the fall thus far. Now, sure, the pilot has its flaws and rough edges ... but to me this is far and away one of the most exciting new shows of the season, one whose potential to be a kickass action-adventure show far outweighs its weaknesses.

I really enjoyed the pilot episode overall. To me, the biggest weakness of the original version that I saw was the shoehorned-in subplot involving Jamie's (aka the Bionic Woman's) kid sister, who originally was deaf and basically felt like an unnecessary dose of melodrama, who didn't seem to fit into the sci-fi comic book world of the show and in all honesty kind of dragged things down. Luckily, the new version of the pilot recasts the sister and reduces her role, which in my estimation is a good thing. Perhaps later her story can be brought to the forefront, but for now there's way too much going on here to dwell on Jamie's family issues.

And there IS a LOT going on here. Which to me is a good thing. With shows like Lost and Heroes and 24, TV has been cluttered of late with serialized shows that feature long, drawn-out storylines. And usually, there's nothing wrong with that. But there's also got to be a place for shows like Prison Break and now Bionic Woman, that feature a more chaotic, information-packed style of presentation. I love how the Bionic pilot lays so many cards out on the table. In particular, the real gem here is Katee Sackhoff as Sarah Corvus, aka the "original" Bionic Woman.

Katee Sackhoff plain and simply rules it on this show. She has the perfect look to play a psycho-bitch cyborg - she reminds me a bit of Daryl Hannah in Blade Runner - stone-cold crazy in the best possible way for a bigtime action villain. Say what you want about the show perhaps jumping the gun by quickly featuring a dramatic, rooftop fight between Sarah Corvis and Jamie Summers, but I thought this was THE geek-out moment of the Fall TV season thus far. Two bionic women, going toe to toe on a rooftop, in a fast-paced fight scene filled with comic book quips plenty of smack-talk? What's not to like?

As for Michelle Ryan as Jamie, well, I think it's about time that there was a female action lead who was kind of an every-woman. Jamie has a kind of average, down-to-earth, girl-next door feel that makes it all the more cool that she is the bionic woman, and not a Jessica Biel type who seems Amazonian from the get-go. The show offers up its share of larger than life super-women in the form of Sarah Corvis. But I think it's cool that Jamie is kind of a blank slate to start things out. I mean, most girls I know are, why shouldn't this one be?

The main problem here, aside from some clunky dialogue here and there, was the presence of a few plot holes that were probably the result of things being a bit rushed, and also some editing that didn't make things run quite as smoothly as they should. The act breaks seemed very abrupt at times, and also, the quick pacing, while great in terms of getting the plot moving, sometime made for some pretty rushed-seeming character moments - ie a kind of out-of-nowhere sex scene between Jamie and her scientist boyfriend, and Jamie rather quickly coming-to-terms with her new abilities and situation. But this looks to be a plot-driven show, and don't we already have Heroes if we want to watch 22 straight episodes of a character coming to terms with who they really are?

But, there is a lot of potential here, and I like the fact that we have a dark, stylish, over-the-top scifi show on network air that doesn't hide what it is and has a lot of fun with its premise. I don't think that this is a case where the show being "dark" means that it's not fun, by the way. Any show that has Katee Sackhoff deadpanning lines about being the first bionic woman is having some good fun, in my eyes. I said the same about Chuck, that it fully embraces its geekiness, and Bionic does the same. That will make it polarizing to many, but I was very pleasently surprised. this could have been a generic, homogenized show - part of the new trend of high-concept sci-fi that is about everything BUT actually exploring its own premise (see: Jericho). Instead, we got a pretty badass show, and I'm curious and excited to see where it goes from here.

My Grade: A -