Midseason report card: Is ‘The Tomorrow People’ worthy of being the show of today?

“The Tomorrow People” for the time being is really a tale of two shows. For the first half of it, it was something that we considered to be pretty dreadful. We didn’t buy Stephen being in high school, we couldn’t see Jedikiah being a name for anything other than someone in The Bible, and it was really hard to understand the way in which all of these powers work. We’re somewhat bummed that everyone’s abilities seem to be the same, so some of the fun and creativity is sapped out of it.

But as time progressed, the show did start to improve to the point where we were at least engaged watching it. Are there still problems? Sure, with the major one being the attempt to set Stephen and Cara up as the chosen couple, thus seemingly shafting his rather sweet friend Astrid that has loved him THE WHOLE TIME. But at least we are starting to become invested in the characters, right? We at least have figured out everyone’s name, a chunk of their backstory, and why they matter to the world. For example, John is a few steps away from evil most of the time. Meanwhile, Russell acts crazy and/or edgy a lot.

But the reason that we are not doing this Midseason Report Card entry in the same way as some of the others is because we really don’t feel like there is that much to break down here. The show is basically suffering from just not knowing itself fully yet. It started to figure it out a good six or so weeks into the season, when it started to become more serialized and focused on the characters that matter. This is standard for a lot of shows starting out with nothing more than a premise. “Arrow” was not the best in its first six episodes, either; the same goes for “Once Upon a Time.” Some shows need a little bit more time to find themselves than others, and realize what they need to do next in order to get better. In this case, it is to allow Stephen to have a little bit of fun and ground the character, but also give the Tomorrow People themselves interesting stories that mean something. Don’t just pre-ordain Stephen and Cara to be a couple someday, and make those stories a little more complex and not just CW series 101.

Based on the past few episodes, “The Tomorrow People” for right now has earned a passing grade. It feels like it is doing its homework and improving; but, if the show starts to settle back into its old habits of being listless and over-dramatic, we’re going to start to think that it’s not capable of any sort of greatness at all. Grade: C.

Photo: The CW