‘The Tomorrow People’ episode 2 review: Still stuck on today
We really want to like “The Tomorrow People.” It’s based on a beloved series
from the United Kingdom, it has superheroes, and there’s plenty of action. Plus, we know that some ladies and gentlemen out there probably enjoy the sight of all the shirtless, sweaty men on here.
But what we have here at the end of the day is a pretty confusing show, one where powers are unclear and loosely defined, and where we have a woman supposedly in high school using the phrase “I’ll be there with bells on.” Not only do the high school characters look as though they are 25, but they talk as though it was 25 years ago. The high school premise alone is so difficult to really grasp onto that it makes the rest of the show troubling, as does the fact that Stephen’s mother decided to keep what happened with her husband and his father a secret until Stephen asked for it seemingly out of the blue (at least in her mind).
There are moments of the show that are enjoyable: Stephen’s mother is pretty fantastic, and we feel for her around a million times more than any other character as she tries to understand what she believes to be some sort of mental illness. It’s unfortunate that the rest of the cast cannot quite follow this same lead. Everything feels so antiquated and disjointed, and for a show that is about powers, the mythology and the many uses of them could be much more easily defined. Why not get us a little montage of some of the various ways in which Stephen can use the powers? The room-cleaning at the start of the episode was one great instance of this, but we’d like to see more.
The rest of the show is just so questionable. It’s obvious that Stephen has some love-interest possibilities, that he is going to continue to skirt the likes between his “job” and his work with the Tomorrow People, and there will be some more people out there that they will try to save. This felt like a procedural episode, and that plus some of the other problems make for a pretty poor start for the show. Perhaps if The CW was not improving their programming, and it did not air after “Arrow,” it would not feel so corny. But this was a letdown from the premiere, and it has some more to do to turn things around. Score: D+
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Photo: The CW