Mars was huge when I was growing up, in the nineties there were even two Mars movies that were released within months of each other while the United States sent the Mars Rover there around this time. We reached the moon long before, so we have envisioned going to Mars ever since. But after the turn of the century our fascination of Mars seemed to wain so far that John Carter removed mention of Mars from its title to avoid alienating viewers. It failed, the movie ended up being possibly the biggest bust in the history of cinema.
But more recently, The Martian was a huge critical and box office success so maybe things are turning around for the red planet. So maybe it is time for a Mars television show. The First depicts Sean Penn and his crew as they try and become the first men and women to set foot on Mars. Okay, by that description and trailer, you would think this is a sci-fi show but a couple episodes that the actual science is not all that important to the writers and this is really just a character study, it is just the characters just so happen to be training to go to Mars. Really, I have not seen a show try this hard to be prestige television since maybe Ray Donovan.
Sure this is 2033 and we get a few technological advances. You can now open your truck door by saying “Open” (voice activation is general is very prevalent), hand signatures have replaced door keys, and apparently Google Glass is entrenched in society. But really the show is more about the characters than what they do. It is not until the final episode when the show goes heavy into the science fiction.
The show starts with Penn as the former mission commander on the eve of a launch of a mission he was removed from because it was for the best. After a complication, NASA then has twenty-three months (at a cost of seventy-billion dollars) until the next window. But again, between the first and last episodes, the mission to Mars is essentially a backdrop.
Instead we get a super serious show where the only “fun” scenes include one involving karaoke and another involving a basketball game. Everyone in the cast seems to be haunted by something. None is more haunted than Penn’s daughter, newcomer Anna Jacoby-Heron who is haunted by the death of her mother while struggling with drug addiction. Since the show is angling to be prestige television, you would think I would complained of a child shoehorned into the story, but this may be the first prestige television child that will not get you reaching for the fast forward button. In fact Jacoby-Heron may actually be the best part of the show. And where more episode seemed to be mostly focused on a certain character, her singular focused episode is a highlight of television so far this year even as the rest of the show can lag at points.
It seemed like Hulu has struggled for a while to decide just how to deliver its episodes. It looked like it had settled on released a couple episodes on launch before going to the traditional weekly format. But it looks like they are shifting to a Netflix model of everything at once with all their fall shows are doing that with the exception of weekly talk show I Love You, America with Sarah Silverman and Into the Dark which actually going the other way with just a new episode every month. Sure I am biased since I grew up that way, but they should reconsider and go back to weekly episode so people can go back to talking about television.
Just look at Castle Rock, sure it was a slow start but by the time episode seven and then nine rolled around, they spawn hundreds of think pieces that I am sure inspire plenty of people to catch up. Episode five of The First could have been that moment for this show. But when you have released everything at once, there is no time to write that think piece because everyone has moved on to the next show. I can see releasing everything for teen leaning shows like Runaways, but if The First is geared towards, maybe Hulu should consider releasing the show the way most adults watch in the future.
All episodes of The First are available tomorrow on Hulu.
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