What I’m Watching: Awake (Series Finale)

Awake: Season 1, Episode 13 “Turtles All the Way Down” (B)

I’m not sure how this show could have ended in a both satisfying and coherent way. I am pleased that the final moments of this season do provide some fitting closure since a second season, not unsurprisingly, will never see the light of day. Though it was strange to see Efrem dressed in a penguin suit pointing out the specifics of the event at which Michael was not present, it did help to sew up the case and allow him the satisfaction of getting Harper to be held accountable for her actions in one universe after she got the upper hand on him on the other. Transferring knowledge between worlds was always the best part of this show, an underdeveloped concept that could have been used more productively. It was effective to watch Michael walk down a hall towards an unknown door, with his two therapists bickering behind him about what it meant, and then to have him open it to enter his home, only to see his son, and then his wife come out to greet him. The problem with all this is that it doesn’t make any sense, and just delivering a happy ending without any sort of justification is a bit of a letdown. I think that this show, which was initially plugged as an “Inception”-style drama, could have been improved by taking advantage of its format more and providing a more exciting story, not simply a cop drama split in two. Ultimately, it did prove interesting, but hardly as invigorating and exciting as I and most others might have hoped.

Season grade: B-
Season MVP: Jason Isaacs as Michael

What I’m Watching: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 12 “Two Birds” (B+)

After last week’s big realization, Michael was back at square one at the start of this episode when he was forced to explain to both of his therapists his theories only to have them tell him that he’s making it up. His universe-traveling proved more useful than ever as he managed to follow up with two dead people since they were only alive in one of the universes. Killing Hawkins didn’t do him any favors with Bird, and it’s fortunate that his partner trusts him enough to allow him to investigate, even if he did deliver him straight into the hands of the person behind everything, who asked all the right questions that people tend to before killing the only people that know their secrets. In the other universe, Hawkins managed to kill Bird instead, and Michael’s joy at waking up to see his partner still alive was palpable. Michael being on the run with Hawkins on his tail is not a good thing, and he’s probably going to go straight to Captain Harper with his suspicions, though she at least seems to have a soft spot for him, expressing anguish at the thought of having him killed. Efrem will likely turn out to be Michael’s saving grace since he can’t believe the news and seems to respond more supportively than Bird, ready to give Michael the chance to explain himself and find out just what’s going on. Hopefully the upcoming season finale will provide fitting closure since it’s also going to double as the series finale.

What I’m Watching: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 11 “Say Hello to My Little Friend” (B)

There’s something depressing about watching a show after you learn that it’s been cancelled, especially if the episodes have already been filmed without such knowledge. This episode, however, took a completely different approach, stranding Michael in one universe after a fall from a rollercoaster and giving him a friendly ghost to haunt his waking hours and make him seem crazy to everyone else around him. Fortunately, that hallucination was Kevin Weisman, best known for playing tech geek Marshall on “Alias,” and I’m thrilled to see him on television again. His best moment was when he recognized himself, and Michael discovered that he was a cop, and coincidentally Bird’s new partner in that universe. The episode lagged a bit in the middle as Detective Hawkins’ imagined doppelganger kept Michael distracted, but it was all worth it for the end, in which another frantic flashback revealed that Detective Hawkins was not just the first officer on the scene of the accident, but the one that caused it in the first place. It’s taken eleven episodes for Michael to realize that he was marked for death, and now he’s going to do something about it, choosing to trust Dr. Evans, the more supportive therapist that we haven’t seen in a while. Being trapped in one world wasn’t a positive experience, and hopefully Michael will have more luck in his other world piecing together who’s after him and figuring out a way to determine just where he belongs, since he doesn’t have much time left.

What I’m Watching: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 10 “Slack Water” (C+)

This episode, which largely takes a departure from the show’s recent trend of providing Michael with key information about a case or his life in one universe that proves useful in the other, hinges entirely on one such revelation from last week. I’m not sure why Hannah doesn’t question Michael’s abrupt announcement that Rex got a girl pregnant, since both she and Emma, along with Emma’s parents, couldn’t possibly think that he just guessed it. Their adoption of Emma following her confirmation of Hannah’s suspicion that she didn’t actually want to give up her baby is quite sudden and definitely transformative. You’d think that Michael would want to tell all of his co-workers that he wasn’t actually leaving before he enjoyed the big goodbye party they threw him, since sticking around after such a lavish event doesn’t tend to bode well. Captain Harper, who seems to have a real friendship with Michael, despite her malicious dealings, was especially dismayed to hear about Michael’s cancelled relocation since it means that the hit put out on him will be reinstated to ensure that he doesn’t discover the drug trafficking that he was presumably so close to exposing prior to his accident. A second season for this show is hardly guaranteed, so the show would do well to explain exactly what’s happening over the course of the season’s final three episodes. The other main plotline involving elderly renters and a conniving landlord was hardly memorable, and made that universe’s events rather dull and unspectacular.

What I’m Watching: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 9 “Game Day” (B+)

This show is getting better as it’s starting to tease out Michael’s realizations about how his worlds are connected, and I’m pleased that the show is letting them speak for themselves rather than having Michael verbalize them so that his therapists can shoot down their validity. I can stomach Rex’s unfortunate conversations about how to tell if someone’s lying if it means that Michael can discover that Emma is pregnant in the world in which Rex is no longer alive. Michael being able to pick up on the subtle differences in between his two worlds, where one team wins or Emma doesn’t have an abortion, means that he’s not accepting his realities as fabrications but instead working to bring them together in some productive way. Unfortunately, Hannah likely won’t be pleased if Michael will want to stay in town to help Emma along with their grandchild, and that could prove problematic. The quality of the cases is also improving, as Rob’s murder case proved to be full of twists, as was the hunt for the arsonist that burnt down the laundromat. I’m always happy to see Francois Chau, best known for his role as a scientist with many different names in “Lost,” here playing the laundromat owner in hopeless debt. The backdrop of the big game in both worlds was a good way of amping up the excitement, and it’s nice to know that Vega has become fond enough of Michael to want to plan him a goodbye party, though something tells me he may not be in need of it anymore.

What I’m Watching: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 8 “Nightswimming” (B)

Here what we have is an episode that’s almost entirely devoid of any connections between Michael’s two universes, and perhaps more significantly, one in which neither of his shrinks appear. The one exception to the first rule was when Ayelet Zurer’s hysterical wife shouted at him that he couldn’t imagine what it feels like to leave everything behind, which was followed up immediately by Michael awakening in his other life to find Hannah packing up and throwing away most of his life in their garage. Michael’s relationship with his C.I. Jake was most telling in terms of what’s holding him back, the notion that he’s just so willing and ready to move on and leave his old life behind. To him, of course, it hasn’t been easy, and we’ll have to see what ends up happening in terms of his being tethered to his location due to his dual existence. Running around naked at the beginning of the episode proved merely to be the amusing epilogue to a rare bit of levity, in which Michael and Hannah went skinny-dipping in the pool, only to trip an alarm and get themselves discovered by the law. Neither case of the week was exceptionally strong, as the C.I.’s purposely bad information obviously went nowhere, and preparing for witness protection proved intense but ultimately anticlimactic since neither the husband nor the wife was terribly compelling as a character. Michael’s a good cop, but, to an extent, he’s only as good as the case he’s assigned in each of his universes.

What I’m Watching: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 7 “Ricky’s Tacos” (B)

I liked this episode because it barely featured Rex and only minimally focused on Hannah and her plans to repair the house so that they could put it on the market in preparation for their move to Oregon. This is monumental because the show actually had time to focus on its developments, featuring not one but two compelling cases and forging an extremely enticing and intriguing link between the two worlds, revealing in the process that Michael is actually close to uncovering some serious information. Michael hearing things at Ricky’s Tacos was interesting, and it’s hard to figure out just how to interpret that particular scene, yet what’s conveyed in that moment is crucial. The fact that there’s a hit out on Michael in one universe can’t be good, but it’s reassuring to know that Captain Harper at least cares enough to try to spare Michael’s life by telling those itching for his corpse that he’s leaving town. The case of the suicidal girl who approached multiple guys asking for sex took an unexpected and dark turn with the revelation that her father was the guilty party, and it was a treat to see Michael and Harper pull off the interrogation room trick together. The case of El Diablo also demonstrated Michael’s abilities, while enabling him the opportunity to give Vega some important policework advice. The “For Sale” sign going up on Michael’s lawn at the end of the episode is a big thing, and though I can’t imagine Michael will actually be able to leave town, I’m so intrigued to see how that would be handled.

What I’m Watching: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 6 “That’s Not My Penguin” (B-)

When a character on a serious drama sees a penguin standing a few feet from him, it’s time to question the show’s validity. Yet the penguin is clearly meant to be a sign that Michael is losing his grip on reality, mainly due to the ketamine injected in him by Gabriel the hostage-taker. It’s crucial, however, once he learns that Dr. Lee wasn’t actually present in the hospital with him, and that he was hallucinating him too, which lends credence to the fact that Michael is getting lost in his dual lives. The opening scene with Dr. Lee’s discussion of schizophrenia and the paired shots of Michael getting confused in both of his realities was quite effective in a rather literal way, and that’s where this episode’s strengths lay. Michael telling Gabriel that his sister was fine rather than breaking the news to him about her being dead was another interesting development, and it’s good that his peculiar condition is useful for something. Rex having a girl over came as a huge shock since he hasn’t done much since his kidnapping, which seems to have been entirely forgotten as he now goes around without Michael keeping much track of him. It turns out Emma is a good influence on both Rex and Michael, even if her first exchange with her boyfriend’s father was to give back the stolen jewelry her boyfriend gave to her. Michael could use some positive relationships outside of work, because he’s going to drown carrying his splintered state all by himself.

What I’m Watching: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 5 “Oregon” (B)

I’m pleased to report that this episode was markedly better than those that have preceded it, and this show could well be headed in a positive direction. Megan Dodds’ Agent Santoro helped to spice up the usual blood around the precinct, and she definitely didn’t think fondly of Michael. It may have been a bit far-fetched that Michael was implicated as a potential copycat killer and taken into custody, but the fact that he was so immediately released by his partner needs to be overlooked also. What was truly interesting about Agent Santoro’s appearance was that she was from Portland, just as Hannah was seriously considering a move to Portland. The fact that it’s not spelled out which came first, and whether one is simply an extension of the other, is so interesting, and I liked Michael’s assertion that this is how things are and he’s not looking to change them. Prioritizing one universe over the other makes sense given that Michael’s search for the real killer was the more worthwhile of the two worlds, and, just like last time, he netted an important clue from one reality and brought it over with him to the other. The killer’s call at the end of the episode was appropriately haunting, and it’s reassuring, at least somewhat, to see someone confirm that Michael’s existence is legitimate, even if no one else believes him and he can’t possibly explain it to them. It’s better that it’s not a regular character, but it may give Michael some solace to know that at least one person doesn’t think he’s completely crazy.

What I’m Watching: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 4 “Kate is Enough” (C+)

In theory, there’s something extremely interesting about having a character, more than just a suspect or victim in a case, that exists in dramatically different fashion in two universes. Amy Smart’s character in “The Butterfly Effect” immediately comes to mind, as she played a sorority sister in one universe and a prostitute in the other. Rex’s old babysitter Kate wasn’t nearly as intriguing in her dual role that put her opposite Michael in the interrogation room. It’s increasingly irritating to hear both Dr. Lee and Dr. Evans demean Michael’s dual existence by referring to the other universe as a dream, and shocking him into reality is not a productive solution. It seems that we’ve totally forgotten about Laura Innes’ character, the police captain who was somehow involved in creating Michael’s situation by bringing about the car crash, and I think it would be very worthwhile to return to that to give some relevance to Michael’s splintered reality. It was exceedingly obvious from the opening moments in which Rex got into a fight with his friend because he used his racket that said racket had been a gift from his mother, and this show needs to step up its plotting so that its familial interactions are far more complex and interesting. Taking over the job of playing the obvious culprit on TV shows from Raphael Sbarge, currently seen as a good guy on “Once Upon a Time,” is Eric Lange, here playing one of the company men and best known as the irritable Radzinsky on “Lost.”

Take Three: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 3 “Guilty” (C+)

Maybe it’s just me, but it seems awfully early to have a member of Michael’s immediate family be put in danger in a way other than that which they experience each episode by not existing in one universe. When Michael recognized Cooper, I was concerned that, once again, he had encountered him in his other reality, and when Rex got snatched, I predicted that Hannah was going to get kidnapped as well. I have to give this show some credit for not going down either of those routes, and instead having Michael smartly interrogate Cooper in jail to determine where he might have left Rex in the other reality. That part was extremely cool, at least conceptually, when Michael was told to get some rest and he popped a sleeping pill so that he could reawaken in the other reality and do some detective work. He’s doing a superb job in both universes of alienating his partners, not letting Bird in on the fact that Cooper kidnapped his son and bossing Efrem around like it’s his job. Like it or not, Tara has now inserted herself into the Britten family’s life by being present at Rex’s abduction, and I assume she’ll just get closer and closer with Rex and maybe even Michael, though something tells me he’ll have a tough time dating considering his wife is still alive in his head. I thought that the show had completely forgotten about that world since it wasn’t featured for the first half of the episode, but with that and the reduced screen time for the psychiatrists, maybe that’s where this show is headed, honing in more on the characters and less on the universes and their links. Is that a good thing, though? I’m not so sure.

Round Two: Awake

Awake: Season 1, Episode 2 “The Little Guy” (C+)

Watching this episode, I found myself almost entirely uninterested in its events. The problem with a show like this is that the premise is the hook, not the week-to-week plot developments. The links between Michael’s cases in both universes seem random at best, and his partners aren’t going to be able to deal with his antics much longer. The introduction of Laura Innes’ Captain Tricia Harper once again puts her at the forefront of an evil movement with unclear malicious aims after her role on a former NBC show, “The Event.” What that means for this show is that there’s something afoot that defies explanation, yet it’s man-made rather than supernatural in nature, and the explicit mention of the accident being caused is but the first clue in what’s sure to be a lengthy and sparse journey towards clarity and satisfaction. At this point, watching Michael solve conflicting cases isn’t going to keep the interest up, and it would help if either his wife or his son was slightly more interesting. His secret motorcycle habit isn’t exactly groundbreaking, and having him watch his wife ride the bike in one universe and his son ride it in the other universe verges on being forced. Neither of his therapists are helping the situation much by being entirely unsupportive of his other reality as anything other than a dream. Though she was optimistic in episode one, even Cherry Jones’ Dr. Evans doesn’t seem to buy Michael’s situation as anything other than a fantasy.

Pilot Review: Awake

Awake (NBC)
Premiered Mar 1 at 10pm

It’s been a long time since this show was announced, and after being put online a week early, it’s finally here. This is the kind of series with a cool concept, but it’s hard to see where it’s going in the long run and if it’s headed towards any kind of grander realization. There have been many shows that have attempted to have multiple realities, with varying degrees of success. “Awake” is particularly reminiscent of “Life on Mars,” remade by ABC several years ago and following the adventures of a modern-day cop somehow transported to the 1970s, unsure of whether his new life was but a dream. That question is addressed head-on here, with B.D. Wong’s aggressive psychiatrist Dr. Lee telling Michael that he’s deluding himself by thinking that the world in which his son survived is anything but imaginary. Cherry Jones’ Dr. Evans is more kindly, and her usage of the Constitution was particularly strong and clever. Though there are certain to be inconsistencies along the way, I do like the fact that there are already threads that link the two worlds, with the criminals differing only in crime. It reminds me of the “X-Files” episode in which the same day kept repeating with slight variances in conversation and activity rather than just the exact same events and dialogue. Steve Harris and Wilmer Valderrama make for decent partners in the part of this series that’s a strict procedural cop show, and I have a feeling that Michaela McManus’ role will only grow as Rex becomes more attached to his coach. Jason Isaacs is a great choice to play Michael, capable of conveying his fatigue and desperation in the way that he speaks and carries himself. The sci-fi geek in me got excited when Hannah told Michael to tell Rex she loved him as they were going to sleep, and I hope that show emphasizes partial clarity as it goes forward, because it could be quite intriguing.

How will it work as a series? Shows like this have a tendency to start strong and then get lost in the banality of ordinary events, so if this show does its best to mete out a few plausible (or far-fetched) reasons that things are occurring as they are, this show could get more interesting by the minute, just as long as it doesn’t get dragged down by a need to probe into its characters more than into its mythology.
How long will it last? This show premiered strong, beating the debuts of “The Firm” and “Prime Suspect,” and NBC could really use a hit right about now. Even if this is just a fancy spin on a procedural, I think NBC is going to want to put its faith in it and stick by it. If its numbers continue, a renewal is likely to follow.

Pilot grade: B