Malicious Monday-The River Review

Sometimes a show is cancelled because it's ahead of it's time. Other times, it's just because it isn't very good. The River, a series that lasted eight episodes on ABC from the director of Paranormal Activity, is actually a little of Column A and a little of Column B.

Dr. Emmett Cole was an esteemed explorer, making documentaries of his adventures enjoyed by millions. But when he doesn't return from his latest voyage into the Amazon, his wife and son get a film crew together so that a new documentary about rescuing him can fund their expedition into the rainforest.

This series is genuinely fascinating in concept alone. It's a found-footage horror series set in the Amazon rainforest. Either aspect would be unique on it's own, but together? It honestly had the potential to be top-quality TV. While found-footage has it's detractors, it's just a subgenre of horror, and like every other type of horror there's a lot of schlock between the good ones. At it's best, found footage allows for a level of realism and audience engagement harder to find elsewhere, while also allowing for a lower budget.

The setting is also interesting. Most horror stories are either set in modern times, usually in some abandoned building or old town, or in the past. More often than not the setting is directly tied to human beings, either to give a sense that we've invading on something's territory or that we somehow caused our own horror. The Amazon is it's own fascinating setting, allowing for modern characters to face nature at it's most primal level and see horrors gone unseen by many, while also giving a great reason why escaping is so difficult.

So why was this cancelled after just one eight-episode season? Was it another case of the executives not understanding greatness? No. It just had bad ratings. And it had bad ratings because...it's not really great. It's mostly just...okay.

The scripts are fine. Some episodes are pretty good, some are kinda bad, most are just watchable. The acting is uneven, some actors struggle to deliver their dialogue believably, while others like the ever awesome Paul Blackthorne make what could be stock archetypes into the best characters on the show.

The series definitely had growing pains, with some of it's weakest stories appearing early on, likely driving off potential viewers. Still, The River isn't just a story-of-the-week show, there's a lot of serialized storytelling, and that actually works pretty well for it. Even if a particular episode comes off as week, the ongoing storyline is usually enough to hold your interest until the next episode.

It's actually really hard to review a show this short. It had less episodes than Firefly, and in that time it was more intriguing than enjoyable. I have to give it major credit for shaking up the status quo in the latter half of the series, and ending with stuff that made me really interested in more of it.

But is that good finish worth the lackluster start? Is a great cliffhanger a plus if there's nothing after it? That depends on you. Personally, I'm happy to have seen The River, even if it didn't change my life. It had some really great ideas and showed that a found-footage horror tv series could be done, hopefully even better than here. If you're interested in unique concepts, even if they're not executed brilliantly, than the series is worth a viewing. If you prefer to stick to higher quality works, then this is probably a pass.

#tvseries #monday