The Passage review – A cult vampire novel loses the sting on a small screen | Television and radio

YWe learn a lot in the first five minutes of The Pbadage: a 250-year-old man is locked in a mountain in the highlands of Bolivia, the word "vampire" will not be used but they exist, "death would have been better" Because anyone bitten by one, there is a global pandemic of bird flu and although the story begins with "two longtime friends who wanted to make the world a better place," it really does of the girl with the voiceover.

Such content could constitute a hundred or so pages of writing, if allowed to breathe, which is not surprising – The Pbadage is an adaptation of Justin Cronin's beloved novel, the first of a kind. a trilogy, published in 2010. The book, both vampire novel and post-apocalyptic thriller – it covers 766 pages and a century, with huge time jumps and many characters.

It is an undeniably powerful and voluminous source material, which attracted the attention of Ridley Scott, who had opted for it before publication, but which could become a potential element, then languish in limbo before being reconfigured for the first time. small screen, where he now comes with considerable luggage. Last year, he underwent radical rehearsals and, despite the novel's great popularity, his television premiere seems strangely suffocated.

Like the book, it begins about the present; In anticipation of a disastrous flu pandemic in the United States, secret project scientists Noah in Colorado are hoping to melt a virus that cures humans, but also turns them into catatonic blood-sucking and light-intolerant monsters. Scientists, led by Dr. Jonas Lear (Henry Ian Cusick) and Dr. Nichole Sykes (Caroline Chikezie), have tested strains on death row inmates, but they need a child brain (he has more than neurons, or something) to eliminate the vampire side effects.

They send Special Agent Brad Wolgast (Mark-Paul Gosselaar) under the supervision of his former friend Clark Richards (Vincent Piazza, voice more serious than any character development in the series) to fetch a child that nothing will miss : Amy, a 10 year old orphan: Amy, an orphan Bellafonte (Saniyya Sidney), occasional narrator of the show. But as Amy's and Brad's father-daughter ties grow on the road and captive vampires soften their terrifying strength in the Noah project, the plan goes as planned.

The Pbadage hangs on the intrigue inherent in its sources: the specter of the undead, the fascination of apocalyptic scenarios, attractive actors looking at each other, l? natural instinct to discover information intentionally concealed. It's been decades since these bases are reinforced on television – good news for The Pbadage, because all those who already know The Walking Dead, The Gifted and about 10 other recent shows will find them.

Ironically, for a show about the thorny and fragile ethics of humanity, the Pbadage has the impression of being written by an algorithm – as if someone had plugged names and places into a generator of 12 Steps to a Scenario "that elevates the dialogue from motivational remarks. Pbadage humans speak in one or the other exhibition, clunkers ("I have the impression that I need to move and maybe to have another baby, "says Brad's ex-wife, presents her engagement) or comments from a" details to humanize your characters, "in Tonight Show. Everyone is watching very difficult. To say that a show puts a strain on credulity means nothing, but still: The Pbadage asks you to believe that a beautiful white woman in the mid-twenties who would never be sentenced in the United States is nevertheless forgotten on death row. Emotional baggage is persistently tagged but not transported between scenes; that vampires want to escape imprisonment and that harbadment gives them the most human and intuitive reaction of the series.

The Pbadage is a frustrating mechanic and yet, being human, you can not help but feel at least slightly invested in this endangered world. It causes dark circles, but the virus is easily caught. Establish issues of end of the world and drama; put attractive actors next to each other and create a tension, even lukewarm. The Pbadage, as a show, does not transcend his ideas, because he is not necessarily obliged to do so. The human viewers, knowing what they are winning, will lubricate the mechanisms of the drama.

This leaves the Pbadage in a strange border area – dead humans but undead, invented and obvious characters but still fun, a show that you may not like in style or substance but that you will continue to look, anyway.