FALL TV EXTRAVAGANZA!!!

BEDLAM

** 1/2 (out of ****)

Could this be the year horror takes over television? With American Horror Story (which will be covered on this week’s podcast!) and the decidely un-American, very British Bedlam, the answer is-probably not? Horror is still too much of a niche genre to get the widespread support a TV show needs to flourish and continue. It needs a ‘Lost’ style show to absolutely blow expectations and suck a crazy amount of viewers in to take over. Someday… I’m intrigued with horror on television because they can’t use gore to hide a lack of actual suspense like the average horror movie does. I would say they also can’t hide behind tits, but the pilot of Bedlam proved they have different rules about nudity in Britain, and they’r bringing that progressiveness to BBC America. Bedlam is set at Bedlam Heights, a new apartment complex that used to be an insane asylum, where many inmates were tortured. As we all know, torturing someone to death makes them a pissed off ghost, and pissed off ghosts hate anyone coming to the place they like to haunt. The main character is Jed Harper, who has been institutionalized himself due to the fact that he has been able to see ghosts since he was a kid. He come to Bedlam Heights because his phone keeps texting him “save Kate”, who is his cousin and happens to live at and work for the Heights. Scary things happen, misdirection occurs, and a ghost tries to kill people. Most of this was handled fairly well, though we’ve seen similar stories before. The show is obviously going to be a ‘freak of the week’ type set up, where Jed fights off/helps a new vengeful spirit each episode. The last shot of the pilot showed the Heights from the exterior, and the place is absolutely crawling with angry spirits- it’s strange none of them have caused trouble before he showed up. The lead female, Kate, is an absolute twat. I’m not sure if we’re supposed to connect to her at all, but in the first minute of her on screen she’s fucking over her best friend- after that I don’t care if she gets killed or not. Unless the show will also have an arc of redemption for her, that could work. The magical texting phone was never explained, and that drove me nuts. I don’t understand why it’s needed, unless just as a cop-out to give Jed the deets on where he needs to be to save people. The acting was a mixed bag across the board, the most common flaw with everyone going too big at times. That’s a normal horror trope that hopefully gets worked out in the show’s development. I think if this was is handled right, it could become a good character piece focusing on normal human issues like family, love, expectations on the backdrop of dealing with murderous ghosts. The most intriguing part of the show happened in the last ten seconds, where spray painted on the outside wall of the compound were the omnipresent words “Save Kate”, until a truck pulls away revealing the whole message reads “Save yourselves from Kate”. SInce this is a British show, this season only has 6 episodes and Ill definitely keep up to figure out what that message means.-MG