Is Amazon learning? The latest batch of Amazon Originals pilots is a cut above the last group—both on the adult and the children’s side—with several shows that would make for enjoyable additions to the TV landscape. Here, we take a look at the pilots intended for adults.
The After: The After marks Chris Carter’s first foray into science-fiction television since The X-Files ended, and what it lacks in story it makes up for in style. The pilot is instantly gripping, slowly unfolding horror for its characters with a precision that has Carter’s fingerprints all over it. To offer more detail would be to ruin the story—and that’s the modus operandi of The After, too, which offers confusion instead of answers. What’s frustrating about this pilot is how little it reveals about the nature of whatever world-changing apocalypse has befallen the characters—it could be a terrorist attack, aliens, peak oil, or nuclear winter. The result is frustrating yet fantastic, because Carter deftly makes a show ostensibly about a disaster into a show about this random group of people trying to survive. Though the cast is populated with relative unknowns, they bring a surprising amount of talent to the screen—particularly Louise Monot, who plays deliberately counter-cast lead. There are already hints that whatever this disaster is, it has traces of the supernatural. But most importantly, it’s impeccably shot and carefully structured. There are mysteries here, but The After knows exactly what it’s doing. Carter hasn’t loss his ability to thrill.
Bosch: The Bosch pilot hits screens with a solid pedigree: It’s based on a popular series of crime novels by Michael Connelly, it stars the excellent Titus Welliver, and it’s being brought to life by Eric Overmyer, a veteran of The Wire, Homicide: Life On The Street, and Treme. The episode walks a tricky line, wavering between the types of truly gritty drama that Overmyer is known for and a more mainstream procedural tone. When the grizzled veteran cop is out doing his job, he feels real (or at least TV-real). When he’s bantering with stock characters like the sexy female prosecutor or the Internal Affairs guy who won’t get off his ass—Will he say “rat squad”? Of course he will—the show isn’t nearly as strong. As an introduction to a character, however, the episode works well, playing out parallel stories that show both sides of his personality. On the one hand, Bosch is in civil court defending himself in the shooting death of a man he suspected of being a serial rapist and killer; on the other, he’s out in the field, investigating the skeletal remains of a boy found in the L.A. hills. The stuff that doesn’t really work—including the fact that Welliver and the creators may not have a 100 percent lock on who this character is yet—could easily be repaired over the course of a few episodes. Once the world is established, a solid, HBO-styled cop show could emerge.
Mozart In The Jungle: One of the chief advantages of Amazon, Hulu, and Netflix’s entry into the scripted programming game is that they can pick up programs that nobody else on TV would greenlight. In the wild and inventive new dramedy Mozart In The Jungle, Amazon has the sort of thing it’s impossible to imagine anywhere else. Set in the ultra-competitive world of professional classical music, the series Mozart most resembles is Canadian masterpiece Slings And Arrows. Written by Roman Coppola, Jason Schwartzman, and Alex Timbers (the young theatrical genius who directed Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson and Peter And The Starcatchers) and directed by Paul Weitz, Mozart plunges immediately into the life of Hailey (unknown Lola Kirke), a young oboist who wants nothing more than to join the symphony under the aegis of new conductor Rodrigo (Gael Garcia Bernal). The pilot is possessed of jokes both weird—a musical version of a famous play scored by Styx—and character-based, which bodes well for the future. Even if not everything lands, the sense of smart, passionate people making a life out of making art pervades every scene, just like in Slings.