TV: No Ordinary Family

[Munsu]

http://img830.imageshack.us/img830/3011/noordinaryfamily.jpg

One of my most anticipated new series started last night on ABC, No Ordinary Family. Anyone else watched it?

I saw the pilot about a month ago and thought it was OK, not as good as I wanted it to be, but it showed plenty of promise. In all, it should be a fun show to watch. Of course it helps that it stars Rita and Detective Vic Mackey.

Seen most of the new shows so far, and for the most part they haven't been impressive. This at least shows some promise.


About the Show

The Powells are about to go from ordinary to extraordinary. After 16 years of marriage, Jim (Michael Chiklis, The Shield Fantastic Four) feels disconnected from his workaholic wife, Stephanie (Julie Benz, Dexter), and two teenage children, Daphne (Kay Panabaker, Summerland) and JJ (Jimmy Bennett, Star Trek). To encourage family bonding time, Jim decides the family will join Stephanie on her business trip to South America. When their plane crashes into the Amazon River, they barely enjoy a moment to celebrate their survival before returning to the grind of everyday life. But they will soon realize that their lives have been forever changed. Each member of the family starts to show signs of new, unique and distinct super powers. Will their newfound abilities finally bring them together or push them further apart?



"To me, it's a show about a family that is repaired
in the unlikeliest of ways, whose new abilities allow each
family member to feel special in ways each of them always
wanted to, yet perhaps never thought possible.
It's a show about the blessings and burdens of
being extraordinary."
- Jon Harmon Feldman, co-creator/executive producer



Jim feels powerless as he realizes his life is not turning out the way he planned. His children are growing more independent, and his wife spends more time at the office than home as she rockets up the corporate ladder. His job as a police sketch artist only furthers his insecurities as he watches his peers fight crime and catch criminals. However, when Jim discovers that the plane crash left him with the power of super strength, he immediately feels a new sense of purpose and empowerment. With the aid of his best friend and confidant, George (Romany Malco, The 40 Year Old Virgin Weeds), he sets his sights on becoming a hero.

Stephanie struggles to balance her family life with working 80 hours a week as an award-winning scientist. Her boss and mentor, Dr. Dayton King (Stephen Collins, 7th Heaven), continues to guide and challenge Stephanie's research in the lab. While fearful of never finding balance in her life, something remarkable happens. After the crash, she develops the power of speed, which allows her to move effortlessly through her daily responsibilities. Always the scientist, Stephanie immediately questions the phenomenon and demands answers. She entrusts her lab tech, Katie (Autumn Reeser, The OC), with her secret, and the two begin to research the mystery behind the powers.

For 16-year-old Daphne and 14-year-old JJ, adolescence is hard enough. Daphne dreads distraction from her own fabulousness, but that's exactly what happens when she turns telepathic. Daphne hears other people's hopes, dreams, fears and joys, whether she cares to or not. Younger brother JJ struggles constantly to satisfy his parents and teachers as he grapples with a learning disability and bad grades. Already feeling inferior to his popular sister and brilliant mom, JJ hits a new low when everyone acquires powers except him - until suddenly JJ's mental abilities strengthen to a super genius level.



"It's kind of a fun throwback to some of the
action adventure series I watched so much as a kid.
As audiences get more sophisticated you try to
blend genres. We wanted to make something the
whole family could watch together."
- Greg Berlanti, co-creator/executive producer



For the Powells, embarking on a mission to understand their new abilities becomes the key to rebuilding their family life, as they learn what defines and unifies them. Despite the fact they can collectively lift a car, run at lightning speed, read your mind and calculate the dimensions of the Eiffel Tower -- all before you say "superhero" - they are first and foremost an average family with everyday problems.

http://abc.go.com/shows/no-ordinary-family

[iMUSTbeTHEdevil]

I saw the pilot last night. I couldn't help but notice how long the hour felt. Which is never a good thing. It just moved really slowly and I am having a hard time believing that the show will make it more than 1 season. I could be wrong, but that is how I felt with the Pilot.

[Munsu]

I saw the pilot last night. I couldn't help but notice how long the hour felt. Which is never a good thing. It just moved really slowly and I am having a hard time believing that the show will make it more than 1 season. I could be wrong, but that is how I felt with the Pilot.

You're completely correct in how slow it felt, but I think that's just the show wetting its feet. I thought what occured in the later portion of the episode showed some promise, with the villians angle. But we'll see.

In all, one of the better series of the new series, so I'm going to stick to it for the time being. This has been a very disappointing slate of new shows.

[Sapphire]

This episode was boring crap. Everyone was all emo about strung-out issues like falling out of love, being a bored housewife who needs more adderol, and teen cheating. The family is upper middle class (of course) so they really actually have no real problems whatsoever.

I hate the snobby girl too.

There's no interesting or compelling dynamics in this show WHATSOEVER! Everyone is a cookie cut character from the cuttiest of cookies. The premise is even worse, a plane somehow randomly crashes into a RANDOM body of water with RANDOM mysterious magical goo.

Now take the family from 'Modern Family' and give them superpowers? THAT's a show.

The CGI was actually very cool but not enough to redeem how crap boring the show was.

[Munsu]

Even though I enjoyed the episode, I agree with you above. I'll just say this, many of the things you're complaining about are on-purpose use of cliches, since there's a bit of a parody angle.

I agree that the family drama is annoying so far, and I hate both kids. But I'm willing to give this a shot since it at least should bring a fun element and I'm interested in seeing how they incorporate the villians.

I won't be surprised if this end up being a turd of a series, but for what has come out this season, this is among the best (which says something of the new shows this year) so I'm willing to stick with it for the time being.

I'm not going to try and convince anyone about this shows greatness. In all, it should be more entertaining than Heroes (though Heroes had a more interesting angle to it), and quite a few people here watched Kyle XY if I remember correctly, I'm sure those viewers will have little problems with this show.

[Sapphire]

This show is actually so rage-inducingly terrible that I may just keep watching it because Heroes, my favorite show to hate, was cancelled. Need weekly snarking material~

[Assassin]

dont hate, have sex instead.

[Munsu]

Watched the 2nd episode, liked it less than the first one, but the episode had a good ending... a bit unexpected at this point.

[iMUSTbeTHEdevil]

I saw the second episode. It was pretty good. I just don't think that the world needs a "G-Rated Heroes". So I hope that they start being a little more daring/graphic with the action.