Inexplicably, the show remains a hit with 5.05 million watching the second episode... For similar shows on similar networks, Manifest had 2.76 when it got cancelled (debut episode had 10.4 million though), Extant 4.5 million (9.5 million debut) and most recently Debris got cancelled after season finale got 2.43 million and started with 4.37 million. So looks like La Brea is going to be a bubble show this season - might get cancelled, might not. Which is a surprise already - it looked like a one and done for sure when the trailers dropped.
LOL One episode is airing at 11 am here. That's way out of NBC scheduled programming time frame. It's almost like it was moved to syndication status immediately.
This show feels kind of like a throwback to late 90s and early 2000s sci-fi TV and I actually enjoy that about it. Not everything needs to be some megabudget small screen blockbuster. The biggest issue I have three episodes in is that I think they've got way too many character drama subplots. I feel that half of them could be cut and their screentime used for more survival and creature action.
Of course the creature action is not what the show is actually about. Its about the drama with creatures as a backdrop, and if you don't like it, this show isn't for you. Its sci-fi as window dressing.
Shockingly, this show is barreling toward renewal! 6.37 rock solid opening, falling to 5.05 million ford the 2nd ep, and staying in the ballpark with 3rd ep (5.09 million). These are rock solid NBC numbers. Here is some context: Debris started with 4.37 million and cancelled with 2.43. Manifest started with 10.40 million (wow) Was down to 5.36 million by the end of season 1. Stabled off and was renewed for season 3 with 4.36 million (solid) and got moved to netflix with 2.75 million. So it seems that if LA Brea stays above the 3 million viewers per episode mark it will keep getting new episodes on NBC. Personally, I didn't even expect we'd see a complete first season.
For more context, the superhero sitcom Powerless started with a low 3.10 million and got cancelled without getting to finish the season. 2.03 was the rating for the last episode which aired. So any move into the low 3 million on NBC seems to put you into danger.
I don't expect non-stop creature action. That would get tiring and be unrealistic. What I mean is that I'd rather not have some dramatic backstory revelation in every episode.
Well I finally caught up with this series to the event they discover a walled village. It's just too slow for me honestly I rather re-watch LOST or the Magicians as a comparison of time invested. So I'm done. As an aside, 'Debris', put the hook in me right out of the gate and it got canceled. Go figure! Life is not fare but best wishes to the fans of this show.
I think I would have preferred this more as a mystery show.... The guy having visions, the mystery of the sinkholes, finding the portal, developing the craft, exploring a conspiracy in the modern day, with the 10000 bc reveal and discovering survivors only as a late season twist, kind of like how you had no idea Fringe was about alternate universes until the first season finale.
I will watch most anything that has the promise of dinosaurs, but I couldn't make it through the first episode. Of course, once the Dire wolves showed up I figured there would be no dinosaurs, so my interest started to die, but if the characters had been even slightly interesting I could have hung on, but no. The husband having visions was the last straw. I started watching Debris, but it was mostly the same, week after week -- We have feeeeeelings! Sob, sob! There is nothing on network tv that i watch anymore. Terrible writing just destroys any interest and most of it is derivative.
I called one of the twists that was just revealed, but nothing really seems to be falling into place yet. Any thoughts or speculation so far?
I honestly didn’t see the twist coming. Funnily enough, I find the explanation of the visions being memories harder to buy than them just being visions. It means that Gavin has been remembering events at precisely the right times and in chronological order. I see that a second season has been ordered. I’m kinda surprised but I am glad. While this show has plenty of issues (where are the prehistoric creatures?!), I am finding myself enjoying it.
Well I had called that he must have came from that place, when they said he was found as a kid just wandering alone, and figured being from there, was causing the visions. It just being memories was definitely kind of hokey. Definitely did NOT call that he was THAT kid..... I thought that even in that place, he would have disappeared a couple decades earlier. I figured the 1800s gold would have been there for 150+ years, that time was more or less synched up; if a sky person fell through 30 years ago, it would be someone from the 90s, and so on. Definitely feeling like it should have been a movie.... last second rescue evading military planes to get in the hole and save everyone, after just barely delaying their doomed launch, would have been a great way to end the film. First couple acts would have been prehistoric animals, rescuing other survivors from the village, and getting the plane fixed for the doomed attempt would have compromised the middle. Could have been a pretty fun romp. Right now it seems like a lot of stretched out character drama for no reason at all. Things are getting interesting with the question of, where did those people all originate from? Some from the 1800s? Some from a passenger boat? Lots of different villages scattered around? Its kind of catching my interest. Still think it all being in the hollow / concave earth theory would have been more fun than just more time travel. They have shown some prehistoric creatures, and some regular animals that we would recognize. Its only 12,000 years ago, so really, not so far back that things should be that unrecognizable, so in a way, they probably got that right. Definitely odd that he got the memories chronologically, like, he didn't see his wife and kid stuck there, until after they got stuck there; but I'm not sure things are as synchronous as it seems... do we know that the timelines are synched up like that?
My main issue is that the animals have just stopped even being a threat the characters worry about. In the very first episode, their camp gets attacked by dire wolves and now they freely wander around the woods without any fear of being attacked by anything. Also, I want to see mastodons, just cause they're cool.