Commander-In-Chief

“If Moses had been a woman leading the Jews in the desert, she’d have stopped and asked for directions. They’d have been in Israel in a week.� –former first lady, Grace Bridges.

Commander-In-Chief’s primary achievement is managing to almost make the possibility of its premise plausible. In some ways, this show seems like another entry in the science fiction/fantasy boom of shows, after all, we’re talking about a woman, Independent (as opposed to Republican or Democrat), former university chancellor occupying the Oval Office. I’m on record believing that this country would sooner see a black man than a woman as president, though the show wants to seize the moment of a possible presidential bid by Senator Hillary Clinton.

Created by Rod Lurie (the short-lived, but superb, Line of Fire, The Contender) and going where The West Wing has gone before, Commander-In-Chief mines whatever zeitgeist is left for interest in presidential politics. Balancing family drama and the world of cutthroat politics, Mackenzie Allen (Geena Davis, displaying a gravitas that will finally put Pirate Island long behind her), like President Barlett, seems too good to be true, a fantasy creation of wish fulfillment. She plays her president with a mix of idealism and maternal groundedness (though with enough edge to order the boys around).

The show features a superb supporting cast. Kyle Secor (Homicide: Life on the Streets) plays Rod Allen, President Allen’s husband and former chief of staff when she was only the vice president. Harry Lennix (Matrix Reloaded, Matrix Revolutions) is Jim Gardner, her new chief of staff. Hopefully they will give US Attorney General Melanie Blackstone (Leslie Hope from 24 and Line of Fire) more to do. Most of the characters, thus far, are one note ciphers, underutilized at best. At any rate, they have cast the scene chewing Donald Sutherland (Lord of War, The Italian Job, Cold Mountain) as the president’s arch-political rival, Speaker of the House Nathan Templeton, “an SOB and a liar and he cheats at poker� (as the former president describes him). He oozes both charm and venom with every sentence, a perfect villain to balance President Allen’s innate goodness.

Several storylines and tensions are ably played against each other. This show suffers in comparison to The West Wing, which it will invariably be compared, lacking both its intelligence and complexity. Nor does it particularly aim to rise above competent drama, choosing to play up the family drama in order to distinguish it from The West Wing.

“She’s a woman. It’s so easy to deal with women if you just remember they’re not men.� –Nathan Templeton

The show is not subtle, framing their argument such that only old school, repugnant chauvinists out of step with the times would oppose the idea of a female president, Commander-In-Chief allows the opportunity for an interesting examination of role reversals. Rod Allen, already used to being the husband of a powerful woman, is shunted from being her chief of staff to learning the art of being the first ... gentleman. He has to figure out how to do the role traditionally left to women of powerful men, trying to figure out what it means to be her help-mate and the proper support. The task falls to him to keep a stable home life while she does the salaried “work�.

The show also ramps up the debate on how we view women in society. On the one hand, modern society says that all people are created equal. On the other hand, we relegate women to second class citizen status. The same values that run through our still patriarchal society infect the church also. Within the church’s more conservative circles, teachings espouse traditional “gender roles� as biblically mandated, as part of the “creation order� (Adam then Eve, to reduce the point to its most basic argument). The father/husband should be the head of the household (overlooking two important things: 1) we’ve applied the connotation of “authority� and “master� to the verse’s use of the word “head�, implying a hierarchical order; and 2) we conveniently forget such context setting verses like how we are to “submit to one another�). Furthermore, the idea of male headship has been extrapolated into every aspect of societal leadership in general.

Some argue that this role of male unilateral decision making is unbiblical and contrived by taking the Bible out of context and forcing, or rather, justifying our societal mores with the original biblical text language. This wouldn’t be unprecedented: for hundreds of years, the Bible was used to justify slavery and segregation, then as society’s views on this changed, the way people interpreted the Bible’s position on the topic changed as well. Maybe now we are ready to believe and practice that men and women are created to be equal partners, to be equally valued, and both to exercise dominion in creation and redemption.

“Why do you want to be President ... the answer that you should be giving me is that you want to be President because you want the power to control the universe ... People who don’t want power have no idea what to do with it, they have no idea how to use it when they have it.� –Nathan Templeton

The question that comes to mind is what do we want in and ask from our leaders? We hold them a higher standard, to a moral high ground, and want them to lead by example and with humility because they represent the best of us. They devote themselves to a higher principle, be it God, Nation, The Corporation or Duty. The role of a spiritual leader, for example, is pursue God’s will first, then to move people from where they are to where God wants them to be. By persuasion and example, leaders move their followers from pursuing their own agenda to God’s, serving and empowering them in the process. Leaders realize that they are ultimately accountable to God, or to their higher principle, such as The Nation. They don’t blame their followers, they don’t make excuses. Christ was a servant-leader, not a dominator forcing people to his will. By our standards of power usage and what it means to be a kingdom, this may seem naive, but Christ’s mission has always been a subversive one, not using the ways of the world to accomplish it.

While not having the realism and snap that heralded the early seasons of The West Wing, Commander-In-Chief is a capable show. Is America ready for a female president? Probably not, but before now, it was a difficult scenario to even imagine. Just as 24 laid the groundwork for a possible black president, Commander-In-Chief puts forth the idea that if we are truly the leaders of the free world, maybe we can continue to lead by example. Or, as President Allen puts it, “the character of any nation is judged by its people.�

The Gospel and The Black Church

Very few movies deal in a real and knowledgeable way with the black church. The Gospel, however, is set against the backdrop of the historic black church and its role within the black community. The movie does well exploring aspects of the historic black church. For example, the black church has always had a missional component to it, serving a socio-political role as well as a spiritual one (and even an economic one). With issues of poverty and economic and social justice at its forefront, the black church—again, historically—has been socially conscious and remained relevant.

Another tradition of the black church is its incorporation of song, dance, and call-and-response into a worship service. Worship has always been experiential within the tradition of the black church. Some people tend to look at black churches and think that the attenders are in it for the emotional ride. There is an affect, but it is a cognitive affectiveness, where truth is felt and worship is (intuitively) experiential. The emotional ride of worship is done within the narrative of the Gospel. Narrative theology, the emphasis on story-telling, thus has always been a critical part of the preaching tradition.

Which is not to say that the church is without problems.

“There is no perfect church ... there is a perfect God.� –Pastor Fred Taylor

The church presented in The Gospel, New Revelations, is indicative of far too many churches, black or otherwise. Aspects of our modern culture have insinuated themelves into the fabric of the church, deterring or outright corrupting its ministry. Values such as corporate policy and philosophy have been bought into by the church. Some people see the main job of the pastor as that of businessman, and the church as a business. The pastor becomes the CEO and the elders the board of directors. Offerings or tithes become income, or worse, profit; and this reduces the Gospel to little more than a product they’re trying to push. The biggest question I was left wondering was “what is the Gospel?�

“You know the Bible backward and forward ... but you still have no clue. You need Jesus.� –Charlene (Nona Gaye)

A crisis looms within the church, not just the black church, as it is losing its youth and facing shrinking congregations. How else can we explain our youth seeking a sense of family in gangs rather than in church? The decline of men in church attendance? The continuing break up of families? Somehow, the message is not connecting with a whole generation. Perhaps it starts in the mentality with which we approach church: for instance, measuring a church’s success by its size. Pastor Frank—Pastor Taylor’s hand-picked successor—pursues this “bigger is betterâ€� brand of gospel, aiming to be among the gospel “all-starsâ€� with increased radio, tv and magazine-cover presence. Billboards featuring his face, promoting his “new visionâ€� for the church, begin cropping up all over town.

Sunday mornings become about the performance, the show. The pastor and the congregation are equally culpable in lifting him atop a pedestal. Many of these mega-churches have become all about the pastor, his personality, his interpretation of Scripture. It turns people into church consumers, with church members drifting off to the next charismatic preacher or bigger program, because they come together not to form a community but to be entertained or serviced. Ultimately, this mentality ends up producing consumer-Christians content to drive to whoever tickles our ears (with morality as entertainment) and our needs the most—with the church enabling such narcissistic behavior. So churches end up competing for the “foundâ€� and forgetting about the “lost.â€�

“Some might get lost in the hype.� –Pastor Fred Taylor

Pastor Fred Taylor, in effect, becomes a symbol for God. That he serves as a “Christ figure� is most evident in that it’s his death that sets everyone on the often rocky path of redemption. The path of the “lost� son is examined in my first review of The Gospel, but the movie piles subplot on top of subplot, veering dangerously toward a confusing mish-mash. However, the subplot involving the path of the “faithful� son deserves some examination.

Pastor Frank (Idris Elba, a far cry from The Wire), wanting to move the church into the 21st century, falls into the pride trap of equating himself with the church. The church becomes about the building, the legacy of a man, or the cult of personality built up around that man. Meanwhile, the men worry about trying to grow the church, and therein lies the problem. They often “sell their souls� for the sake of growing the church, losing sight of what it means to be a church and what the church should be about. Things like discipleship, learning in community, corporate prayer and worship become ancillary to the mission of growing the church.

The Gospel message, marketed for maximum appeals, transforms into a message of health-and -wealth promises or a kind of “pie in the sky when you die� philosophy rather than starting with how to live your life here and now. Preaching a message of prosperity, but convinced that they have to look the part, for Pastor Frank means pursuing a course of a new facility (and a better car). This leads Pastor Taylor to gently rebuke him that “We should spend a little less time looking good and spend a little more time actually being good.� Ministry gets reduced to a battle of egos between Pastor Frank, David Taylor, and even one of the church elders. All of which brings to mind the Parable of the Two Sons:

"What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, 'Son, go and work today in the vineyard.' " 'I will not,' he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. "Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, 'I will, sir,' but he did not go. "Which of the two did what his father wanted?" Matthew 21:28-31 (New International Version)

The church has to be about the work of God’s kingdom, without its leaders losing sight of that fact in a rush to build their own personal empire. As a people, we’ve gone from being a church to going to church, forgetting that we who gather together for corporate worship on the weekend do the work of the church through the week. Forgetting that each member contributes to the mission of the church. The Gospel message is that God has Good News (that His Kingdom is at hand) meant for the world, He has chosen to use the church in order to share it, and we are invited to be a part of it. This is the lesson learned, and the reconciliation found, by the end of The Gospel.

The Gospel

One of the things that the reviewers at Hollywood Jesus attempt to do is wrestle with movies, one of the voices of our pop culture—meet them where they are, and make connections from where they are to the Gospel message of Jesus Christ. In other words, we like to appreciate art for art’s sake. So when a movie like The Gospel comes along, it either makes our job that much easier or that much more difficult. One of my major fears when it comes to “Christianâ€� movies is that the audience is going to get less “storyâ€� and more “propaganda.â€� Actually, The Gospel is the latest entry in the “sub-genreâ€� of small-budget black movies, more in the vein of Diary of a Mad Black Woman and Woman Thou Art Loosed. But when you go, expect to “have church.â€�

The Gospel, in a nutshell, is the story of “The Prodigal Son� set to Gospel music, lots of Gospel music. The movie recaps the story in its closing moments. There was a man with two sons, both of whom he wanted to follow in his footsteps. The prodigal decided to live life on his own terms, while the other remained with his father. Soon, however, the road got rough and the prodigal ended up doing all sorts of things to survive, eventually hitting rock bottom. He realized that he had placed himself in that situation, prayed about it, and returned home. His father prepared a huge celebration for him in order to say “welcome home.� In other words, it is a story of ruin and reconciliation, a story of a spiritual journey.

The father in this case, Pastor Fred Taylor (Clifton Powell), spent his time busy doing church, New Revelations, and business, forgetting that his first and primary ministry is to his family. Because he was absent—doing the Lord’s work at the expense of his family—his son, David “DTâ€� Taylor (Boris Kodjoe), struck out on his own. Pursuing a career in “secularâ€� music, he rode to the top of the charts with his hit single “Let Me Undress You.â€� His lifestyle became one focused solely on himself and his own needs, descending into a spiral of selfishness, separation and sensuality, cutting himself off from his family and church while treating women as disposable items. This self-degradation, though the way his world might measure success might not have seen it this way, set him on a path squarely set for his eventual moral (and possibly financial) ruin.

“Okay God, what do you want from me?� –David Taylor

One of the axioms thrown at people is that once you hit rock bottom, reach the end of your ability to do things on your own, God has you exactly where He wants you: dependent on Him. It takes David a while to see where his own efforts have landed him; to paraphrase his manager, he had developed a case of ‘bad boy gets saved by a good girl in church’ syndrome. The girl in this case being former American Idol contestant, Tamyra Gray (as Rain)—a lead soloist in the church choir—who reminds him that motivations are important for why he wishes to return to church. It couldn’t be a matter of him returning just to be with her (and thus, due to a piling of subplots, she is removed from the equation).

David’s decision, his conviction of faith, has to be a matter of repentance. The question then becomes “repentance from what?� Pursuing a “secular� career in music is no sin. Choosing not to follow in his father’s footsteps is no sin. However, pride and self-reliance (to the exclusion of God), seeking his own path apart from God, those were the things of which he needed to repent. Only then would he be able to return to the church that he had known, to the life he was meant to lead, and be reconciled with the people in his life.

The movie features gospel performances by Fred Hammond, Yolanda Adams, Tamyra Gray, Martha Munizzi and loads of music by Kirk Franklin. Luckily, for the sake of entertainment, when the plot reaches an inconvenient snag, the audience gets treated to a gospel performance.

The movie is not subtle. The characters are a little too one-dimensional, the storyline’s a bit too simplistic, and the movie wraps up a little too abruptly and tidy (if somewhat unclearly). Writer/director Rob Hardy opts to wave a magic wand making every character better rather than provide a feeling of each of them arriving at the natural conclusion of their respective journeys. However, though The Gospel has its problems, when in doubt, you can just close your eyes and ride the soundtrack. Guaranteed, you’ll come out of this movie with a dance in your steps and a song in your heart.

Invasion

“For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.� Ephesians 6:12 (New International Version)

Invasion of the Body Snatchers seems to be remade every generation: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978), Body Snatchers (1993) and now Invasion (which might as well be Invasion of the Body Snatchers: The Series). Considering that the original was a thinly-veiled political commentary on the fear of communism, I wonder what anxiety this current iteration will tap into. Perhaps the fear of a government out of control.

Created by Shaun Cassidy (The Agency, the cult classic American Gothic), Invasion unfolds the story of a small town, Homestead, at the edge of the Florida Everglades besieged by a hurricane and strange goings-on. The hurricane opener that sets all subsequent events into motion has a special resonance in light of recent events and tragedies, and apparently covers the landing of aliens. A U.S. Park Ranger, Russell Varon, played by Eddie Cibrian (Third Watch) tries to keep his family together while investigating what is happening within his town. Cibrian plays essentially the same character he did in Third Watch (I keep expecting someone to call out “Jimmy�), without the character flaws that made him a more interesting character. Standing along side his conspiracy loving brother-in-law (Tyler Labine), they are threatened by a gathering of sinister forces both military and alien.

At the heart of the series is a tangled web of relationships. Russell is married to Larkin (Lisa Sheridan), a TV reporter. His ex-wife, Dr. Mariel Underlay (Kari Matchett), is now married to Sheriff Tom. The two kids bop back and forth between the two couples. The community begins to clean up and put their lives back together, cut off and under siege by quarantine and martial law, led by William Fichtner (Go, Crash) as Sheriff Tom Underlay, continuing Cassidy’s usage of sinister sheriffs (like the anti-Andy Griffith from American Gothic. In fact, Fichtner seems to channel Gary Cole’s character, oozing menace every time he’s on the screen).

In a lot of ways, Invasion plays out like the movie Signs: an alien invasion story set against the backdrop of how it impacts a family. Like any family, they don’t quite fit together well and are trying to figure out the balance of tolerating and relating to one another; and this is before the aliens come a-visiting. Invasion follows the hit show Lost, guaranteeing a potentially large audience pre-primed for this type of show. Invasion, however, doesn’t have the show device of flashbacks to flesh out and deepen the story, so it doesn’t have the luxury of the week-to-week leisurely hinting that Lost does and it’s plot will have to move with greater speed to sustain its audience (or it may go the way of HBO’s Carnival).

“How can you explain the unexplainable?� Mayor Littles (Holmes Osborne)

One of the things that horror as a genre does so well is examine the fears that we all live with. The fear of evil, of death, of monsters, be they inhuman or entirely too human. That is the basis of the spiritual implications of the show. We have this sense that things aren’t as they should be, that people aren’t who we think them to be. The people we k now and love being ... different. Looking the same on the surface but being strangers underneath. “Are there monsters?� Varon’s daughter asks, and the answer is a resounding “yes.� With Invasion, those monsters are both without and within. The monsters, the extra-terrestrial biological entities, represent the unseen power that we suspect lurk around us, are a part of our everyday lives even if we don’t realize it. I think part of our suspicions have fueled the rise in the belief in both angels and aliens in our pop cultural consciousness. We have a sense, and we work it out in our art, that we do indeed struggle against spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realm.

“It’s like part of me is here. Another part, a different part, is pulling me away.� Dr. Mariel Underlay (Kari Matchett)

Yet, we look around us, seeing the evil that people are capable of completely on their own and realize that part of this same battle is fought inside us. Turning out gaze within, we know that there is an evil that lurks within us, that is a part of us with which we also struggle against. Invasion captures the reality of us struggling against our own flesh (our inherent weakness as human beings) as well as powers beyond us. We forget who we really are, what we were created to be, and are left as lost, bewildered, and stumbling through this life as those infected by the alien presence.

“God’s in charge. I just handle the paperwork.� Sheriff Tom Underlay

A mix of horror and science fiction, Invasion is a great companion for Lost. It’s a very good s how with a strong cast and a great storyteller behind it. It’s subtle, not in your face, with the groundwork laid for an intriguing series. Especially if you remember, like Lost, it’s less about the mystery and more about the people.

Night Stalker

“Looking for answers to questions I’m only learning how to ask. About things adults dismiss. But children are right to fear shapes that lurk in the darkness. Nightmares that intrude from another realm. Forces that spring not from the imagination, but live amongst us. Unseen. These forces have taken something from me.� Carl Kolchak, the Night Stalker

There is a new wave of genre shows coming to television this fall: Ghost Whisperer, Supernatural, Surface, Invasion, Threshold. Night Stalker is the latest entry. The original series, Kolchak: the Night Stalker was a show that greatly influenced the creation of the X-Files (Frank Spotnitz of the X-Files has come full circle and is a writer and executive producer for the show). Though it’s been a long time since I’ve seen the original short-lived series (Kolchak: The Night Stalker, 1974-1975), I still have fond memories of the show (and it has been, coincidently, released on DVD).

Night Stalker follows the story of crime reporter, Carl Kolchak (Stuart Townsend) newly hired to the L.A. paper The Beacon and paired with “seniorâ€� crime reporter, Perri Reed (Gabrielle Union). Together, they investigate mysterious deaths and strange happenings, which may be related to the death of Kolchak’s wife—a death that a member of the FBI still considers Kolchak having a hand in. Though it did provide an “originâ€� for Kolchak, the show gave no explanations and little to show that there’s an on-going mystery to be solved beyond some vague conspiracy against him. Even with the back story, you don’t feel like you can identify with him or any of the characters. I’m waiting for something approaching chemistry to develop between Kolchak and Reed, besides a pale imitation of her Scully to Kolchak’s Mulder.

The show lacks a certain spark, though not for lack of trying. In the updating of the show, they haven’t done much besides upgrade the cars and the technology. Night Stalker sticks to the monster-of-the-week formula done so often in the X-Files. Its chaotic direction style, meant to enhance the creepiness and excitement, only muddles the action. The show takes itself so seriously, retaining none of the original’s humor. Stuart Townsend’s Carl Kolchak seems awfully young and can’t quite convey the sense of world-weariness that Kolchak should be exuding. That wouldn’t have been as big a deal for me, if they hadn’t have digitally inserted Darren McGavin, the original Kolchak, into a background scene in the newsroom.

“You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday.� Psalm 91:5-6 (New International Version)

Fear, doubt, broken relationships, suffering, horror, death (some of these words highlighted in Kolchak’s voice overs): we’ve learn to live with these symptoms of a fallen world. We know that something is wrong with creation, but we’ve learned to pretend that it’s not there. As a crime victim tells Perri Reed, “there are no answers. People get desperate for an explanation. Sometimes they believe the unbelievable.�

Some questions have no answers, or at least answers that we’d be satisfied with. Wondering why evil exists or why bad things happen to good people: these are things that we all have to wrestle with for ourselves. It’s what marks the journey of faith because some things have to be experienced, not taught.

Night Stalker, like the X-Files, is about faith and the pursuit of the truth—faith in things that go bump in the night, principalities, unseen forces, and faith that there is some reason behind them all. It speaks to our feeling that something terrible is happening. For Kolchak, strange deaths and mysterious circumstances fit together like pieces in a grand puzzle that he doesn’t understand yet. The show examines the darkness that haunts our world, and stalks us, explaining how we are all like Kolchak, “a man drawn to a story that so closely mirrors his own.â€�

Grey’s Anatomy

“To be a good surgeon, you have to think like a surgeon. Emotions are messy. Tuck them neatly away and step into a clean sterile room where the procedure is simple. Cut, suture, and close ... But sometimes you’re faced with a cut that won’t heal. A cut that rips the stitches wide open.�

Thus opens the second season of Grey’s Anatomy, the surprise hit for ABC at the end of last season that caused them to shelve and then move Boston Legal. Paired with Desperate Housewives, and keeping a larger share of its audience, Grey’s Anatomy continues the trend of the meaningful, wraparound narrator voice over that gives so much weight to Desperate Housewives.

Grey’s Anatomy is out-ER-ing the still lingering ER, following the personal and professional lives of five surgical interns (“grunts, nobodies, bottom of the surgical food chain�). Meredith Grey (Ellen Pompeo) is the daughter of a famous doctor (Dr. Ellis Grey), now suffering from a debilitating disease. She inadvertently finds herself involved with her supervisor, Dr. Derek Shepherd (Patrick Dempsey) and ends up rooming with a couple of her fellow interns.

The loosely-drawn characters border on being one-note cliches, but they are well-acted, solidly written, and well used. There’s the ambitious/career-focused intern (Sandra Oh’s Dr. Cristina Yang, though this could easily describe her supervisor with whom she gets involved, Isaiah Washington’s Dr. Preston Burke). There’s the “angry, black boss� (Chandra Wilson’s Dr. Miranda Bailey though this could easily describe their chief, James Pickens Jr’s Dr. Richard Webber). There’s the affable, yet hapless with women Dr. George O’Malley (T.R. Knight) and the selfish, self-absorbed cad, Dr. Alex Karev (Justin Chambers), who sees patients as “pieces of meat� and surgeons as “butchers.�

Grey's Anatomy focuses on young people struggling to be doctors and doctors struggling to stay human. Surgeons are particularly vulnerable to developing God-complexes. They have to be confident and sure, and as interns, have to pursue procedures in order to hone (and demonstrate) their gifts. So on the one hand, they get to hold lives in their hands, seeing the marvel of God’s creation in intricate detail. On the other hand, they can tend to not waste time getting to know the patients except so far as they need to in order to proceed with their procedure. There can be a cost to be paid.

“You ever wake up in the morning, realizing that no one loves you, and ... I don’t know ... care?� Dr. Isobel “Izzie� Stevens (Katherine Heigl)

Such pursuit of career over everything can lead to an empty way of doing life. To make it to the top, to put the job first, as Dr. Webber puts it, is a power kick; however, “you’re never more surrounded, never more alone. You’re everyone’s father, everyone’s boss, and no one’s friend ... No emotions, no compromise, no personal life.� The words “physician heal thyself� become the diagnosis as well as the treatment plan.

Once the problem is correctly identified, a salvation plan is needed, and they turn to a variety of self-salvation schemes. As Dr. Shepherd puts it, “It’s like I was drowning and you saved me. That’s all I know.� The doctors scrape together bits of a life, develop relationships out of their spare moments, and create some sense of community. Unfortunately, even Dr. Grey points out “that’s not enough.�

Funny and sexy, the drama realizes that real life comes down to relationships. Relationships are messy, but they also are only part of what it means to become fully human. To live as we were created—to be and live—involves becoming a disciple, to intern in a new way of living and follow a new rule of life. Else their fates will echo the closing sentiments of the voiceover narrator.

“They say practice makes perfect. Theory is the more you think like a surgeon the better you get at remaining neutral. Clinical. Cut, suture, close. And the harder it becomes to turn it off—to stop thinking like a surgeon—and remember what it means to think like a human being.â€�

Surface

The depths of our oceans, our inner space, is as mysterious and uncharted as the stars, our outer space. If only someone could make an interesting series exploring this idea, capture our imaginations, and provide even a hint of the sinister mysteries that may lie beneath the calm-looking surface of the waters! Surface is not that show. It tries valiantly, but pulls up short.

Undoubtably, the buzzword among television executives for this fall season was “invasion� (that and copy Desperate Housewives, Lost, and CSI). No less than three alien invasion shows hit the airwaves this fall: Threshold, Surface, and, furthering the case for a lack of imagination, Invasion. The central conceit of the show is a tricky balancing act to begin with: the premise basically involves the search for sea monsters. A lot of forethought and creativity has to go into such a project to keep it from falling headlong into silly territory, an unending, uneventful search for the Loch Ness Monster.

Dr. Laura Daughtery (Lake Bell, formerly of Boston Legal), babelicious scientist and single mom, is searching for the origin of life. Studying hot-vent ecosystems at the oceans' depths, she stumbles across a mysterious beast. Bell gives it her all, but only has so much to work with. No one knew what to do with her over at Boston Legal, and here, she doesn’t even have interesting dialogue to work with. She is then drawn into the vortex of vaguely-threatening conspiracy types, ostensibly led by Dr. Aleksander Cirko (Rade Serbedzija), in her pursuit to find out what it is that she encountered. There are a couple other subplots to this sea serpent soap opera to keep our interest afloat, but they not worth mentioning unless you need more examples of some of the absurdities to be found in the show.

Created, written and directed by brothers Josh and Jonas Pate, who have done some interesting work (G vs. E) in the past, Surface doesn’t quite work. The chief problem is that this series takes every cliche of horror (actually, this is the “near beer� of horror), tosses them in a blender, then regurgitates them without much fresh spin. From Jaws to Close Encounters of the Third Kind to E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, there’s not a Spielberg production that this show isn’t afraid to rip from. It borrows every one of Spielberg’s notes, starting with his theme of putting ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. Luckily, they realize that the buildup is usually better than the payoff, so they keep their monsters shadowy at best. Much like their plotlines: it’s like watching a mystery unfold where you don’t care about the answer.

“Does the uncertainty make you nervous?� Dr. Aleksander Cirko
“The men I work for ... they are addicted to facts. They want to know.� Davis Lee (Ian Anthony Dale)

Yet there are some questions at work within the series. With the grand debates going on in the country over Intelligent Design vs. evolution, it is easy to make that spiritual connection. One thing that gets overlooked is that science, as well as religion, is about the pursuit of truth. They take differing paths, follow different methods, and focus on different areas of our lives, but they both pursue truth. They are pitted against one another needlessly, since all truth is God’s truth. And with Surface, the mysteries of creation point to a Creator.

“There is the sea, vast and spacious, teeming with creatures beyond number—living things both large and small. There the ships go to and fro, and the leviathan, which you formed to frolic there.� Psalm 104:25-26 (New International Version)

Surface plays like a B-movie stretched into a series. Not enough thought was put into crafting this series. The plot holes are laughable. There is not one involving character. This is strictly going-through-the-motions television, more trite than suspenseful. The show is too much surface, not enough depth.

Serenity

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Joss Whedon has come full circle. He rose to fame (and fanboy deity status) by taking a failed vision of his movie and turning it into a television cult classic (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) and now has taken a prematurely cancelled television series (Firefly) and turned it into a potential movie franchise with Serenity. Whedon deserved the benefit of the doubt, given his track record, not the ill treatment of airing episodes out of order, especially given his penchant for season-long story arcs. However, the movie has everything a fan could want from a science-fiction space opera: grand special effects, cool fight scenes, and dizzying space battles.

For those concerned about missing out on the 2002 series on which this movie is based, the movie is a fine jumping-on point. Since the show was cancelled eleven episodes into its run, the characters' stories were far from being told. Taking place some five hundred years in the future, Firefly followed a rag-tag crew of not-quite mercenaries—lovable outlaws and former rebels—who search for smuggling jobs (legal or less-than-legal) to make ends meet. Their captain, Mal (Nathan Fillion), does his best Han Solo in a ship so make-shift that it makes the Millennium Falcon look fresh out the factory. Dodging the totalitarian Alliance regime becomes a lot more difficult when the crew picks up a wayward doctor, Simon (Sean Maher) and his mentally ill sister, River (Summer Glau). One of the central mysteries of the show is the basis for the movie: the truth about River.

“Do you understand your part in all this?� –Mal

The show has a background mythology of its own (thus characters are prone to speaking in Chinese as well as English); and picking up on how Star Trek was originally meant to be Wagon Train among the stars, the movie wraps itself in Western trappings to give a real frontier vibe to the show. It’s a self-aware movie that plays up to cliches only to veer in unexpected directions. This time around, the crew is pursued by The Operative (Chiwetel Ejiofor), one of the Alliance’s most competent and ruthless (though stylish) agents, to protect the secret that psychic/weapon River carries in her tortured psyche.

The crew is one “big happy family� that is dysfunctional on its best day—an unsentimental lot who love each other, or are at least honor bound to one another as a crew even though they don’t always like each other much. As with Whedon’s other shows, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and its spin-off, Angel, it feels like he’s writing a super-hero team (much like the comic book he writes, Astonishing X-Men). All the characters have their own power/skill: Mal, the leader; Zoe (Gina Torres), his right hand and fellow soldier; Wash (Alan Tudyk), the pilot; Inara (Morena Baccarin), the Companion; Jayne (Adam Baldwin), the maverick; Kaylee (Jewel Staite), the mechanic; and Shepherd Book (Ron Glass), the Shepherd. Each adds to the body, using their gifts for the sake of the community.

There are many spiritual connections to make in this movie. River needs to become a person, actual and whole; to become fully human. At one point, she even cries out “Please God, make me stone� as a prayer of desperation. Whedon is a well-known agnostic (he claims atheist), and here he attempts to craft a villain out of believers. A certain type of believer, anyway; those who are devout, methodical, and unquestioning of what it is they believe.


“Do you know what your sin is doctor? It’s pride.� –The Operative

“Only one thing’s gonna see you through this. Belief.� –Shepherd

The movie serves as an allegory of sorts for the power of unexamined belief. The Operative believes in a better world, a world without sin, but the way in which he seeks to bring that world about is evil. Also, unfortunately for him, his belief is in a totalitarian regime (the Alliance) that is out of control. The religion is the government and its institutions in a quest to make people better. Though people need to know the truth, true believers are willing to die for that truth. Essentially, Whedon has crafted the believer, those who have faith, as the villain in The Operative. At the same time, and claims of atheism aside, it takes Mal finding faith in order to triumph over The Operative (too bad it required the death of the Christ figure in the movie in order to move him along that path). The conceit being that it is not truth that is the problem, it is the interpretation of that truth.

Serenity reminds us that no battle–even one for a lofty goal such as a world without sin–is fought without cost. With witty banter and humor that can turn in an instant to horror and tragedy, Serenity definitely lives up to its hype as an intense ride. I don’t know how many adventures this crew can survive, but I can’t wait for their next one.