Anastasia Griffith

DVD Review: First Season of NBC Medical Dramas ‘Mercy,’ ‘Trauma’

BrianTT — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 11:37:48 -0400

CHICAGO – It must have been rough to be on the NBC drama team in the fall of 2010. The network brass made it crystal clear that they cared little about scripted drama when they handed over five nights a week to Jay Leno, but the producers of the network’s two new medical dramas “Mercy” and “Trauma” had to push forward with their programs despite the diminishing reputation of their home. Both series made it through the first year but neither graduated to a second season. See what you probably missed with “Mercy: The Complete Series” and “Trauma: Season 1.”

DVD Rating: 2.5/5.0

Neither program deserves mention in the best of the history of NBC, but both are the kind of shows that could have developed creatively if the network wasn’t in such dire straits. In particular, it feels like “Mercy” was unjustly swept under the rug. It’s not a perfect show, but the cast is strong enough that it feels like they should have been granted the time to grow into these characters. Was “Mercy” that much weaker than season one of “ER” or “Grey’s Anatomy”? Nope. But the show fell victim to the erosion of the network and a bumpy first season that often valued cliche over character.

The gorgeous Taylor Schilling stars as Nurse Veronica Flanagan Callahan, a hospital worker who has brought home a few demons from her recent tour in Iraq. Joining Veronica in the hospital drama are the naive Chloe Payne (Michelle Trachtenberg) and tough Sonia Jimenez (Jaime Lee Kirchner) along with strong supporting work from James Tupper, Diego Klatenhoff, Guillermo Diaz, James Le Gros, and a guest turn by James Van Der Beek.

Mercy: The Complete Series was released on DVD on August 3rd, 2010
Photo credit: Universal

“Mercy” finished the 2009-2010 season in 76th place with an average viewership just above 6 million viewers. The cost of the show clearly outweighed keeping it on with ratings that anemic and it’s hard to see the program ever turning into a water-cooler show but I believe that it could have been a reliable stand-by in the middle of the just-passed decade when ratings for shows like this one on NBC were about 50% higher. “Mercy” was not a great program and it’s unlikely that anyone is truly lamenting its passing but if you pick up the complete series set, you will see a show that never really had a chance.

The DVD set courtesy of NBC/Universal is a very accomplished one with stronger-than-average standard video that looks about as well-mastered as some recent Blu-ray releases when upconverted. Each episode is presented in anamorphic widescreen with a 1.78:1 aspect ratio and accompanied by a Dolby Digital 5.1 track. I can’t wait for the day when all TV seasons are released on Blu-ray but this is a very strong old-ray release.

Trauma: Season 1 was released on DVD on August 10th, 2010
Photo credit: Universal

As for special features, the five-disc set includes an exclusive never-before-seen director’s cut of the final episode, ten behind-the-scenes interviews with the stars of “Mercy.” a gag reel, and commentaries as follow — Episode 1.1 “Can We Get That Drink Now?” (Executive Producer/Creator Liz Heldens and Executive Producers Gretchen J. Berg & Aaron Harberts) and Episode 1.14 “I Have a Date” (Series Stars Taylor Schilling, Michelle Trachtenberg, and Jaime Lee Kirchner).

It may be unusually titled “Season 1” but the four-disc set for “Trauma” is also a “Complete Series” release and yet another program that felt like a relic of a former era of NBC. Unlike “Mercy,” “Trauma” started strong and went in the other direction and I’m not sure this show could have ever been fixed. By mid-season, the show too often fumbled as it tried to top the crazy action scene that came before. As they continued to struggle in the ratings, the writers of “Trauma: Season 1” clearly were trying to make a splash and they ignored the real strength of their show — the ensemble talent of Cliff Curtis, Derek Luke, Anastasia Griffith, and Aimee Garcia. It’s a great cast that became lost in the Michael Bay-esque action.

Watching the show again on DVD, it is remarkable that a program with this high of a production value couldn’t get it together. We’ve become so spoiled by film-quality action sequences on TV that they no longer draw on their own without characters for the audience to care about. Something will eventually shake the cobwebs of Leno off of NBC but “Mercy” and “Trauma” were victims of bad timing when the flaws of each program couldn’t be given the time to be worked out.

The DVD release of “Trauma: Season 1” is a bit more disappointing than “Mercy.” The video quality doesn’t look quite as impressive, perhaps because of the on-location shooting and intense action sequences. This is definitely a show that should be been presented in HD. And the relative lack of special features is also disappointing with NBC/Universal including only one commentary on the pilot and a few deleted scenes. “Trauma” may have not had enough fans to get it to a second season but even the few that it did have deserved better.

“Mercy: The Complete Series” stars Taylor Schilling, Jaime Lee Kirchner, Michelle Trachtenberg, James Tupper, Diego Klattenhoff, Guillermo Diaz, James Le Gros, and James Van Der Beek. It was released on DVD on August 3rd, 2010 and is not rated. It runs 941 minutes.

“Trauma: Season 1” stars Cliff Curtis, Derek Luke, Anastasia Griffith, and Aimee Garcia. It was released on DVD on August 10th, 2010 and is not rated. It runs 767 minutes.

By BRIAN TALLERICO
Content Director
HollywoodChicago.com
brian@hollywoodchicago.com

TV Review: NBC’s ‘Trauma’ on Ratings Life Support

BrianTT — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 11:59:51 -0400

CHICAGO – The head-on collision with “The Jay Leno Show” has decimated nearly everything on NBC and it’s going to be a long, uphill climb for it to return to ratings respectability. Even relatively acclaimed new shows like “Parenthood” are struggling as viewers left the peacock net and seem unwilling to return. The already ratings-challenged “Trauma” returns tonight, March 15th, 2010, in an effort to stop the bleeding.

Television Rating: 2.0/5.0

As a part of the anemic Monday nights, “Trauma” has basically already been cancelled once but was shocked back to life after the Leno debacle when the net suddenly found itself with five more hours to fill. Before Leno was cancelled, “Trauma” had finished fourth in its timeslot in every single airing and had plummeted to a series-low of under 5 million viewers for its last airing.

Trauma
Photo credit: Michael Muller/NBC

Last Fall, NBC had announced that they weren’t ordering any more episodes but the original order of 13 was extended to 20 when “The Jay Leno Show” was cancelled. It’s unlikely that “Trauma” will survive the current atmosphere at the net as it’s going to really need to impress between now and its May 10th finale to stay on life support to a second season.

Trauma
Photo credit: Mitchell Haaseth/NBC

“Trauma” is a character-driven, ensemble drama not unlike the net’s classics “Hill Street Blues” and “ER” or their recent abandoned child “Southland” but it is also a program that has remarkably spun its wheels, not really going much of anywhere and viewers have understandably jumped ship. The problem is in the relatively lackluster character writing, the overly familiar set-up, and the melodrama. I actually thought that “Trauma” started as one of the more promising shows of the season but that promise has gone nowhere.

Like all great cop shows or medical dramas, “Trauma” is at its best when it sticks with the reason these shows work - watching people who go above and beyond but also have everyday problems and insecurities like you and me. We need to see oursselves in these superhuman characters and “Trauma” has become such an over-the-top experience that this becomes impossible to do.

Take the newest episode, “Protocol”. By the halfway point, a man has been impaled by a deer while driving and cell-phone talking, another has watched his daughter go into shock which sparked his own heart attack, and a third has jumped out of a moving ambulance and been hit by a car. The “action” of “Trauma” has gotten so brazen in its attempt to shock that it doesn’t have any emotional power. It’s amazing to me that NBC thought this ensemble drama would work better than the great “Southland,” a similar-but-far-superior ensemble crisis show that they let go.

Far more interesting than the action are the actual characters of the San Francisco City Hospital trauma unit as actors like Derek Luke, Cliff Curtis, Aimee Garcia, and Kevin Rankin do their best to turn the melodramatic material into something that feels genuine. But they’re fighting a losing battle. Every time a character on “Trauma” starts to get interesting, the show reverts back to another crazy action scene designed to top the one that came before.

The fact is that “Trauma” would have been a tough sell even in the days when audiences were turning to NBC for quality drama. The fact that the network hasn’t developed a new dramatic hit in years makes it even more difficult to see this being the first. Something will eventually shake the cobwebs off this network and bring it back to life in the post-Leno era. It won’t be “Trauma”.

‘Trauma,’ which airs on NBC, stars MCliff Curtis, Derek Luke, Anastasia Griffith, Aimee Garcia, Taylor Kinney, and Jamey Sheridan. It was created by Dario Scardapane. The show returns on Monday, March 15th, 2010 at 8PM CST.

By BRIAN TALLERICO
Content Director
HollywoodChicago.com
brian@hollywoodchicago.com

TV Review: NBC Delivers Medical Action With Excellent ‘Trauma’

BrianTT — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 16:07:30 -0400

CHICAGO – The wave of new fall shows is coming to an end this week with so many shows having debuted to date that we’ve already had our first cancellation of the season (The CW’s horrible “The Beautiful Life). But NBC has saved one of the best for last in “Trauma,” an expertly produced and acted series that stands as the most promising of the three new medical series this season and arguably the show with the most long-term potential, period.

Television Rating: 4.0/5.0

Character-driven, ensemble dramas like “Trauma” have been the backbone of television for a very long time. From “Hill Street Blues” to “ER,” viewers like to watch people who go above and beyond but also have everyday problems and insecurities like you and me. We need to see ourselves in these superhuman characters. It is their willingness to do what most people won’t that makes them unique but it is our commonalities that make them interesting. The premiere of “Trauma” has that balance of the everyday and the heroic down in the first episode.

Derek Luke
Photo credit: Mitchell Haaseth/NBC

Executive-produced by Peter Berg (who knows a thing or two about the ensemble drama having made NBC’s excellent “Friday Night Lights”), “Trauma” is being sold as the first medical drama series set in the field. These are the men and women who run in the direction of the explosion instead of the other way. When emergencies occur, the team from San Francisco City Hospital are immediately on the clock, knowing that every second counst when it comes to saving lives.

The opening sequence of tonight’s premiere of “Trauma” is a stunner, featuring an adrenalin-pumping helicopter crash that rivals most action sequences currently playing at the multiplex (it’s certainly more well-done than anything in “Surrogates”).

The copter crash sets the stage for some serious psychological scars by a few of the lead characters on “Trauma,” which includes pilot Reuben “Rabbit” Palchuk (Cliff Curtis), paramedic Cameron Boone (Derek Luke), paramadic Nancy Carnahan (Anastasia Griffith), rookie pilot Marisa Benez (Aimee Garcia), rookie EMT Glenn Morris (Taylor Kinney), and Dr. Joe Saviano (Jamey Sheridan).

Being on a trauma team in a major city has to be one of the most stressful jobs in the world. When you lose someone because you couldn’t get there fast enough, how do you let that go? Even on a successful day, one where you save a child’s life, how do you not take home the emotional baggage of that to your own family? It is a job with nothing bug massive highs and the lowest lows - saving lives or losing them. And “Trauma” captures that perfectly.

Anastasia Griffith
Photo credit: Mitchell Haaseth/NBC

The writing and production are very good but the cast of “Trauma” is what truly stands out after episode one. I like the team on “FlashForward” and “Glee” is its own special kind of awesome, but “Trauma” may have the best ensemble of any new show. Curtis and Luke have been great in film for years and bring the same intensity they have on the big screen to the small one. And Griffith takes a plot arc in the first episode that could have been melodramatic and makes it genuine. Let’s hope she’s a breakout star of the season.

Ultimately, the most frustrating thing about “Trauma” is that it’s on a network that has made it clear that they don’t care about shows like “Trauma” any more. The network that brought us “L.A. Law,” “St. Elsewhere,” and “Hill Street Blues” has given up five hours a week of scripted programming to a talk show host (“The Jay Leno Show”). Many TV writers have already made it clear that if NBC is done with them, they’re done with the network. And yet here’s “Trauma,” one of the most well-written shows of the season.

I’m worried that if “Trauma” takes time to find an audience than the network that clearly doesn’t care about writing will be quick to pull the plug. Then again, if the Leno experiment doesn’t work maybe they’ll be more forgiving and switch the focus back to shows like this one. “Trauma” is proof that adult, character-driven dramas are still worth the effort. Who would have guessed that would have been proven on NBC?

‘Trauma,’ which airs on NBC, stars MCliff Curtis, Derek Luke, Anastasia Griffith, Aimee Garcia, Taylor Kinney, and Jamey Sheridan. It was created by Dario Scardapane. The series premiere airs on Monday, September 28th, 2009 at 8PM CST.

By BRIAN TALLERICO
Content Director
HollywoodChicago.com
brian@hollywoodchicago.com