This isn't meant in a bad way, but I'm tired of Painkiller Jane not feeling pain.
For a show about a self-healing genetic oddity, this episode is the second in a row that had nothing to do with Jane Vasco's ability. And the one before that only had one moment that lasted about five seconds. That's just an unforgivable oversight for the show. It's like ER set in a Zen garden, or Sesame Street on the 100th floor of the Empire State Building. Painkiller Jane is supposed to feel pain, not the audience. After the highlight and the promise of last week's story - the best in the series' five episodes to date - this one was a step back, and a disappointment. Proceed with caution.
The one saving grace of this episode was furthering the story line about Jane Vasco's parents. Her mother appears as a vision, a personification of Vasco's deepest fear of being hated rather than loved by the woman she idolizes.
The one overwhelming killing force of this episode was the acting. God, there's less ham on a pig farm. By comparison, Jim Carrey has nuance. It gave Everestian meaning to the term "over the top."
While the idea of someone who can heal themselves is as old as, well Jesus (and beyond), it's at least more original than this cliché-ridden hour. The horror starts with the title itself, of course, "Nothing to Fear But Fear Itself," identified as a quote from "some president" in the show.
What we had here was not the House of Usher.
Strikeforce Vicodin, en masse, take up residence in an FBI safe house to try and find out why the protected witnesses who stay there always get scared out of their wits. They feel anything but safe.
The show opens with an unknown woman who freaks out as she sees visions of the walls cracking and bleeding around her. She's a hematophobic who pales, screams, and kicks her legs at the sight of blood. Another agent afflicted by arachnophobia saw scorpions underneath his blankets. Apparently only Team Vicodin has emotional scars and fears, while crime witnesses only have run-of the mill phobias.
An FBI agent we see later, Russell Camp, is framed through a window looking in. He's also frozen in front of the door where the screaming woman is, oblivious to her noise.
In a wildly successful attempt to ramp up the "hard to resist" part of the show's catch-phrase, "hard to resist, harder to kill," we are treated to a shower scene. Voiceover PJ , while rinsing, talks about how people can look serene on the surface but it almost hides a fear that lies beneath, and fear is more of a motivator than anything else. You can make cleansing a daily ritual, she says, but that fear will stubbornly remain. PJ has a tiny tattoo star on her left wrist, and a running horse that made me flash back to my terrifying "My Little Pony" avoidance days.
Article comments
1 - Chris Beaumont
Ya know, I've tried, but I cannot seem to get into this show....
2 - Temple Stark
I hear you. It's hard to get into for sure because there are cringeworthy moments. The only reason, well two reasons I stick with the show is that I'm ever hopeful that its potential can be reached. As I said up there, the characters are starting to get somewhat richer - and we are only five episodes in.
The other is that I do reviews of the show. I'm really going to have to find a way to record it though, because it's ruining my Fridays something terrible.
There aren't too many people watching it right now.
Oh there is a third reason - Loken's tall. I can almost look her in the eye ;-) But I'm also not interested at all in just focusing on her looks in a review. It's just to easy and feels cheap. I have mentioned her height a few times, though. (5'11")