"The Nine's" Lives Are Just About Up

So about 2/3 of the way through last week's episode of "The Nine" I decided it was time to give up. I didn't even bother to finish watching the episode, I just got up off the couch, grabbed -GASP!- a book, and headed off to bed. You can only allow yourself to be bored for so long. Every man has his breaking point, and as soon as Audrey (or the chick who played Audrey in "24" - I can't remember her character's name on this show) started whining to her shrink, I realized I had hit mine.

Anyway, last night I found myself staring at the screen and thinking of a million different things, not one of which had to do with anything that was being reflected onto my retinas from the direction of the TV. Thus I realized that I don't really care what happened in the bank, largely because I don't really care about the characters. When you're dealing with a show who's premise requires it to be both story and character driven, you better make sure that both are equally compelling, a la "Heroes" or "Lost".

And maybe that's the problem with "The Nine". In both "Heroes" and "Lost" we are living the mystery with the characters, and seeing their true essence and identity develop and evolve as a result of their trying to find the same answers as the audience. "The Nine" on the other hand, has created a "mystery" solely for the purpose of enticing viewers. The characters know what happened in the bank, it's only the audience that doesn't. In that context the mystery aspect of the story can't possibly provide for effective or satisfying character development the way it does in the other shows. My feeling is that the creators are trying to show how a traumatic event such as the one depicted affects the lives of everyone involved. That by itself is actually an interesting idea for a show; so why bog it down with a gimmick that distracts from that goal? Getting rid of that excess baggage would have allowed the writers to create a group of truly complex, compelling characters rather than a bunch of 2-dimensional stereotypes.

Anyway, I gave this show a few weeks, but now I think I quit. I hung around because the pilot was decent, but mostly because I like Tim Daly and want to root for shows he's in. I always thought "Wings" was a decent show, and I really liked last year's cancelled-much-too-early "Eyes", which was also on ABC. But as I've said in other posts, goodwill can only get you so far, and right now "The Nine" is just about out of lives.