Timeless: Pilot

 So I have been watching A LOT of TV lately. I don’t know if it seems that way but I did the pilot for Designated Survivor and then I did the pilot for Westworld, and I’m watching Luke Cage, and I’m pulling myself kicking and screaming to get done with the last 20 or so episodes I have of Lost, I just feel like TV season reviews are going to be trickling out sooner or later and you’re not gonna know what happened. And I’m adding to that list with my review of the pilot for the Time Travel drama, Timeless.

Now on top of a lot of television shows, I have been watching a lot of time travel stories like ALL the Back to the Future movies! It has kind of been my thing for the past month and I actually was looking forward to Timeless.

Timeless actually has a very simple plot. Terrorists break into a science lab that has a time machine. They steal the time machine and start changing events in history. Good guys have their own time machine, and they go and try to stop the terrorists from changing events in history. Week to week episodes take place in some different era or important event.

The main characters make up the core team. You have Lucy (played by Abigail Spencer) a history professor. Wyatt Logan (played by Matt Lanter) the typical soldier of the group who is brought on to actually stop the terrorists. And then you have Rufus Carlin (played by Malcolm Barrett) who is a technician working with the labs before the time machine was stolen.

The really funny part about this pilot was how fast the episode was moving. They really, REALLY wanted to get these characters back in time as soon as they possibly could so we’re not really given much of a background of anything. We don’t know who the criminals are, we don’t know who is developing the time machine, we don’t know who the Chief of Staff from House of Cards really is, everything happens so quickly because they want to get back in time that when they get there, it’s a little bit messy.

The first episode centers on the explosion of the Hindenberg. And don’t get me wrong, when they first get there, its very exciting. They’re racing to the Hindenberg, you see the event from history… and then after that it kind of slows down a little bit and they’re not really sure what to do and they kind of make it up as they go. Which is a line they actually give at the end of the pilot, we can’t make it up as we go anymore. And that’s a pretty good explanation because it really seems like this episode was flying by the seat of its pants and they weren’t exactly sure what they could do, they just knew that there needed to be the introductions to characters, a historic event to prove to the audience that they actually went back in time, and a hinting at a larger story behind the one we’re given at the beginning.

Believe me, by the end of this pilot they do provide some intrigue to make me want to watch at least the next episode or two to see where they’re going with this. However, I think the best thing for this show is to just take a step back, take a breather, and focus on the important thing here. You have a fantastic opportunity here.

If you’ve watched the trailer, you got a little bit of insight into the character of Rufus who is the black technician on the time machine. He’s kind of forced into helping out the group but he flat out says this is a bad idea, that there is no good place for him to go in history because he is black. This might delve into spoilers, but at a certain point in the pilot they end up in jail and he digs into a cop who’s being a little racist and he points out all the great black role models in the future and that history is not on the side of racism. Now in the trailer, they accompany this moment with good swelling music and its actually a pretty cool speech. However, in the pilot he really blows through it and its more of a comedic moment.

Part of the greatness of movies like Back to the Future or these fish out of water stories where someone is in a time that they don’t belong are those moments where they drop a huge amount of wisdom that goes over people in that time’s head because that person is from the future. I think this character has an opportunity to bring both comedic moments and dramatic moments with that fish out of water dynamic but they need to give those moments the time they deserve, especially the dramatic moments if you want us to care about these character. So take a breath, let the audience enjoy the fact that they are time traveling and give the characters some time to react. No pun intended.

Other than that, it’s not a bad pilot. Its just fast moving. Maybe I don’t think the Hindenberg was the best place to start since its not exactly the most interesting event in history, but I’m looking forward to seeing more action packed moments with Timeless.

Future episodes are supposed to take place after the Civil War at Ford’s Theater, in the South Pacific during World War 2 and I’m sure they’re going to have a lot of good locations. I would just hope that the show is able to take a moment and appreciate these locations they’re going to. I hope that they’re not trying to go to a different place each episode because it will be fun to see these character interact with their new environments. I want the characters to have some depth and give some good performances, because the truth is, I want this show to succeed.

Going across time fighting terrorists sounds like a really fun time. But if I’m going to wait a full week for the new episode instead of watching something like Luke Cage I can binge watch on Netflix, the show had better give me something worth my while.

So I think that I’m done picking up new television shows. Yes I have done pilot reviews for Westworld, Designated Survivor, and now Timeless, I am also almost done with all the seasons of Lost on Netflix, I am binge watching Luke Cage, and there’s always something else that comes up that I probably didn’t watch the first time around and am now. I think out of the pilots that I’ve done reviews on, if I had to rank them it would probably go like this.

1. Designated Survivor

2. Westworld

3. Timeless

I like all of them and I’m interested in watching past the pilot episodes of all three.

What about you? Have you seen Timeless? Where would you rank it in pilots that have come out recently? Are there any other shows I should be binge watching? Let me know in the comments below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for movies, and TV shows I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I’ll leave you with this. I'm just about done with Luke Cage and I'm hoping to put up a review in the next day or two. Stay tuned. In the meantime, here's the trailer for the series. Enjoy!