Big Sky 1.1: Pretty Big Deal

 

My wife and I caught David Kelley's Big Sky.  He has a good thing currently going on The Undoing, check out my reviews.  Big Sky, based on the pilot, appears to be another good thing.  [Spoilers below.]

The story takes place in Montana, hence Big Sky.  It has a definite Twin Peaks vibe, replete with a scene in a diner (which shut down, due to Covid, a real Twin Peaks touch right there).  But so far, there's nothing other-worldly or interdimensional.  (I can't recall, was Twin Peaks already in that alternate zone in its first episode?)

But what we do have is a sharp kidnap-sex-slave ring that's been going on for a while, with at least two out-of-the-blue surprises.  A truck-driver who seems an easy going guy (played by Brian Geraghty, who made a good impression on Chicago P. D.) tazes a prostitute (played by non-binary Jesse James Keitel) he picks up at a truck stop, and then two young women whose car broke down on the road in the woods.  And a state trooper (played by John Carroll Lynch, who has made a good impression on dozens of shows) plays a state trooper, who kills a private detective who is looking for the missing women.  One unexpected tazing (the other two were certain to happen as soon as the car broke down on the road) and one unexpected murder are a better-than-average quotient of surprises in a pilot, which usually have only one.

And it's a good thing that the victims were just kidnapped not killed.  They look to be at least a little more interesting-than-usual characters (played by Natalie Alyn Lind and Jade Pettyjohn, in addition to Keitel).  And the murder of the detective leaves the agency in the hands of two women investigators, played by Kylie Bunbury and Katheryn Winnick.  I haven't seen Bunbury before but Winnick was memorable in Bones and even more so in Vikings.

So it looks like we have some good ingredients in Big Sky, and I haven't even mentioned the music, also much better than average.  Hey, it's not too often, if at all, that you hear The Rolling Stones' "It's All Over Now" on a network television show.  See you back here next week,

 

The Undoing 1.1: A Murder, A Missing Person, and NYC Bustling in the Snow

David Kelley's The Undoing mini-series debuted with a star-studded cast on HBO tonight.  I mean, with Nicole Kidman as Grace Fraser a psychologist and Hugh Grant as her husband Jonathan Fraser an oncologist on the posh side of New York City, and a murder and a missing person, we can just stop there and how can you go wrong, right?  You can't.  The first episode was sleek and blockbuster powerful, an East Coast analog in many ways of Kelley's California Big Little Lies, which was pretty hot, suspenseful stuff, too, over two seasons.

[spoilers below]

The Undoing starts off with a nice long build-up of rich mothers (whose kids are in an elite private school) plus one (who's among them on a scholarship) meeting on some auction committee.  Before the hour's over, Elena (the young mother with a scholarship for her son) has a conversation in the nude with Grace in a locker room (that is, Elena has not even a towel around her), Elena on the night of the auction kisses Grace on the lips, and Elena is found brutally murdered the next morning.  And, when Grace tries to let her husband know about the murder -- he left in the morning to (supposedly) to attend a meeting in Cleveland -- she finds that he's gone missing.  About as good a set-up as you're likely to find on any screen.

So here's where we stand:

1. Is there a connection between Elena's murder and Jonathan's disappearance?  We don't know that yet, for sure, but, how could there not be?  

2. Did Jonathan murder Elena?  He's the most likely suspect at this point, his motive being jealousy, or maybe he was sleeping with Elena and she or he wanted to end that.  He did say something to Grace about Elena, and his being missing doesn't help,  but that's all still circumstantial at this point, as they say.  There's even a chance that he, too, could be dead.

3. Any other suspects?  The husband -- Elena's -- is always a possibility, but he seems like a nice guy.  I suppose there's a very outside chance that Grace did it, but she didn't really have the time, and she seemed genuinely shocked to find out about the murder.  So, make that chance very slight and outside.  (My wife suggested Grace's father Franklin.  We don't know much at all about him, but he's played by Donald Sutherland, which suggests some kind of significant role.)

4. How about someone not at all in the first episode?  I'd say no -- Kelley's too good to pull rabbits like that out of a hat.

So we have a nice, taut, high-octane mystery on our hands, set in snowy, pre-pandemic New York City, which is fun to see in any case.  See you back here next week.

 

Goliath on Amazon: Law Drama as it's Meant to be Seen

David Kelley - who created L. A.  Law, The Practice, and so many excellent law shows over the years - has checked in with a powerhouse on Amazon, eight episodes of bruising, exquisite law stripped to the bone or the soul or whatever your deepest buttons in a streaming series that pulls out stops you've never quite seen on any kind of law show on television.

Goliath flatly could not have been done on network television.  It might have been done on a cable, but watching it all at once or at least three or four episodes at a time added to the effect, and likely was even essential to this story.   Indeed, the closest cinematic narrative to Goliath was literally in cinema, The Verdict in 1982, staring Paul Newman as a down-and-out attorney who takes on a huge corporation represented by a mega law firm.   I saw that movie in one sitting, too, and loved it.

Indeed, The Verdict and Goliath also have the similarity of high-wattage star power.  Billy Bob Thornton as the David-like attorney in Goliath is not Paul Newman - who is? - but Thornton is one superb actor, having last distinguished himself on television in Fargo.  And the bad Goliath attorney is played by William Hurt, in of the best performances of his life, even more memorable than James Mason as the big corporate attorney in The Verdict.

But enough with comparisons.   Goliath has a pressingly relevant story about a big U.S. arms manufacturer, and outstanding characters including the judge and supporting lawyers all over the place.

If you like law drama realistically portrayed - and given that my father was a lawyer, I especially do - give yourself a treat and see Goliath.   But don't drink too much coffee or tea beforehand, you'll get all the stimulation you'll need on the screen.