Flashforward 09/24 -- Opinions?

Cafe Society
1

Didn’t see a thread yet, so decided I’d launch one.

Flashforward (ABC) proposes that at 11AM Pacific time on a date in the very near future, more or less the entire human population passes out for two minutes and 17 seconds. During that time, the vast majority of the unconscious see a glimpse of specific events in their lives on a certain date in April 2010.

The worldwide event in question occurs within the first ten minutes of the first episode, and I thought it was fairly brilliantly realized; the rather gruesome implications of everyone who happens to be driving on busy highways falling unconscious and losing control is not shied away from. On the other hand, haven’t the producers kind of shot their wad right then and there? This seems to be a one-time event, never to be repeated, so what’s going fill out the rest of the series?

Well, as it turns out, it’s apparently all a Sinister Plot, with an as yet unknown protagonist and objective, so it appears much of the action to come will consist of unraveling whodunnit and why. Plus plenty of moody introspection is promised as various characters try to figure the meaning of what they saw, whether their visions of the future will really come true (is the glimpse of you, say, cheating on your husband really going to happen?), and why some of them didn’t see anything at all (hint: if your’re not gonna be alive six months from now, you wouldn’t see anything from 7 months out, would you?).

While I found the premise fairly interesting, most the actors (led by Joseph Fiennes and Sonya Walger as an FBI agent in a slightly unlikely marriage with a pediatic surgeon) seem rather colorless in the early going. Syrupy music and plot cliches abound, and what was up with the blue cast to most of the photography?

Anyway, not the best debut I’ve seen, but I think I’ll keep going with for a few weeks at least. You?

2

It held my interest for an hour. That’s rare for me, so I’m sure I’ll keep watching.

3

It’s not quite Lost, but it’s certainly interesting enough to sustain me until Lost comes back.

4

No, sorry. I am not going to invest any more of my time and thought into a show where the Big Mystery will likely not ever be revealed.

If they have sealed the “answer” in a mayonnaise jar on Funk & Wagnals Porch, then maybe.

Otherwise, "We won’t be fooled again!"

5

I’m disappointed, it had next to nothing in common with the book.

Primarily, I’m disappointed because there were no physicist characters. If physicist characters aren’t introduced later on, I’ll be severely disappointed.

Also, the little girl didn’t die during the flashforward, which in the book was the reason the husband and wife divorced.

And in the book, all recording devices that were active during the flashforward recorded only static, and no one stayed conscious during the flashforward.

It’ll be interesting to see how they take it, and just how different it will be from the book.

6

Haven’t seen any more than the 17 minutes up as a preview online earlier in the week. It looks interesting enough for me to have DVRed it tonight. But I come in with trepidation.

I’m one of the rare souls who haven’t seen a single episode of Lost. I’m one of the not so rare souls who tried watching Jericho and gave up. So it’s going to take something major to keep me interested in a “world conspiracy we roll out over the next 12 seasons where every answer leads to two more questions, which is good because even we don’t know the full plot yet either” show.

But we’ll see.

7

I loved the book, but I pretty much knew as soon as I saw the first preview for the show that it was going to steal the premise and pretty much nothing else from Sawyer’s novel. Despite that, I occasionally had the same “that wasn’t in the book!” reaction as Strinka, but overall I found it entertaining, and good enough to keep recording on my DVR for the time being.

8

Anyone else see the footage of the man walking out of Comerica Park and think of this video? The gait is pert near identical.

9

I am not a sci-fi person at all, but I watched and thought it was pretty absorbing, though a few minor things didnt work for me. (the note “You are a terrible husband” and text message “I hope I never see you again”)

The premise is good, but I am also concerned that this may be a show that has no meaningful conclusion—hopefully it will not go too far off the deep end, and will actually show us what we want to see…

10

Also, was that Seth Macfarlane (creator of “Family Guy”) as an FBI agent in the meeting room?

11

Gave it a chance tonight. Had to give up about half way through. Not on my must-see list this season.

12

Count me as someone who’s glad they took the premise and not much else from the book. I found it a slog of irrelevant detail and pointless exposition. Amping up the conspiracy angle should hopefully give the premise a lot more punch.

13

It was.

14

I believe that there was an Oceanic Airlines billboard in the background at one point.:slight_smile:

15

I loved Jericho and have never missed an episode of Lost, so this show really interests me. I’ll keep watching.

16

I haven’t seen it, but it sounds suspiciously like The Midwich Cuckoos in Premise, or Children/Village of the Damned, or the recent series, The 4400… is it anything like these?

17

I’m going to talk about some things involving both the book and the ‘coming this season’ trailer so beware spoilers for those…

It’s definitely being touted as a Lost replacement, what with the mystery and mythology aspects and all. I think the main difference will be that they stay on the science fiction side and won’t venture into the supernatural. The opening scene was very reminiscent of the Lost pilot, with the main character waking up in silence and getting up to discover the larger chaotic disaster scene. And of course the 2 minutes and 17 seconds is a kind of reverse of Lost’s flashbacks.

From what I’m hearing, the show has been pretty well planned out, even beyond the first season, but that each season is encapsulated enough that the ending will be satisfying if it gets canceled before the full run of seasons.

Another advantage is that the main mystery besides how did it happen is what happens when they reach the flashforward date, which coincides with the end of the season - so it’s not like they can drag that out past that point. I’m guessing they’ll wrap up the mysteries surrounding this flashforward and if they get renewed, they’ll have another flashforward to get the next season started.

But maybe I’m like the abused woman who keeps making excuses for her husband. I’m definitely a little gunshy about mystery/mythology shows now, but if any is giong to succeed I think this one will.

I loved the book, but I think they basically just kept the concept and ran with that rather than using the other stuff from the book. I have to say that so far I’m liking the series better than the book.

With regard to physicists, it’s not clear yet whether or not the trigger event (particle accelerator anomaly) will be the same. There’s already some hints that this trigger was possibly intentional. If I remember correctly there wasn’t much mystery in the book about the trigger other than why the accelerator caused it the first time but not the second. I would like to see at least one scientist character, but given the change in focus from the book its makes sense not to have scientists be the major characters. That said, the Simon character in the preview says “I know what happened” so maybe he’s a scientist.

I’m glad they didn’t do this since it was based on a stupidly bogus interpretation of the quantum mechanical 'observer effect. And of course because it let them include the stuff about the brain scans and the mystery guy who was still conscious.

+1!

Not at all. There’s no strange births, devil people, or superpowers. Other than the trigger event (everyone falls unconscious and gets a vision of two minutes from a future date) the series has no science fiction elements, and so far there is no indication that there will be any supernatural elements or superhumans.

18

lol that did occur to me. There was definitely something really creepy about it and eerily familiar. It also reminded me of the birthday party news footage in Signs.

19

I’m baaacck…

I found it odd that there were so many plane crashes. I would think most would be on autopilot. How many flights are typically in air in the US during a weekday?

The one major flaw I saw was that nobody except FBI guy was acting in the flashforward like they were aware that it was a special time. This would be ok if this was the future that would have been without the trigger event but it clearly wasn’t - FBI guy was staring at a wall of Mosaic clues so this must be a future where that happened.

Why wasn’t everyone preparing for that moment? I would have prepared a note for myself to read, giving myself all the information I would have wanted to be revealed to me 6 months earlier. For example, FBI guy knows that his partner is worried about not having a flashback. He should have posted on the board 'tell him not to worry he’s just asleep" or “he’s going to die unless you tell him to do this”. Not to mention “your wife is going to have an affair” and “this is why you started drinking again”.

I really hope they don’t drag out the issue of whether or not the future can be changed since it should be ridiculously easy to prove that it can by a simple act such as getting a tattoo in an obvious place that you remember not having one in the future.

Then there’s the issue of time travel paradoxes, notably predestination (they only know things because they knew them in the future, and they only know them in the future because they had the flashforward).

And of course grandfather paradox - if they change the future, then their past selves won’t have the nfo they need to make that change. Unless there ar multiple iterations with each new future spawning a new timeline. In which case I wonder if this show is supposed to be the first iteration or whether there have already been several iterations.

Or perhaps, but I hope not, the timeloop is totally stable and nothing changes despite efforts to change it.

20

I’m looking forward to seeing more, I liked it. I like time travel as a scifi concept. Lots of things to think about - especially how people will deal with knowing that some future event will happen. Seems like collecting the flashes of millions of people and putting them together could really have an effect - they already mentioned briefly the stock market, an NBA game, etc.

One problem, though, is that there is a book involved, and people here are already talking about what happened in the book. I’m very spoiler adverse, I do NOT want to know what might happen in this show. I probably will not spend too much time in this forum if the book is discussed. Same thing with True Blood thread - too many people saying “in the book so-and-so dies…” . ARRGH!!!