Bionic Woman is a “reimagining” of the 1970s TV show where a woman has bionic strength. We start off with soldiers walking through a bloodbath. They come upon a woman (who we half an hour in learn is named Sarah Corvis, played by Katee Sackhoff, best known as Captain Kara “Starbuck” Thrace in Battlestar Galactica) bent over a mutilated body. She says she didn’t want to and is out of control, then asks the head soldier (Jay, played by Will Yun Lee) to tell him he loves her, she lunges at him, and he shoots her. He then tells her he loves her.
It’s three years later at a bar in San Francisco, and we then shift to an apartment. Why we went from that to this wasn’t made apparent until much later in the episode. Becca Sommers (played by Lucy Hale) and her college aged sister Jaime (played by Michelle Ryan, best known as Zoe in EastEnders, a British soap opera) get into a typical teenager/parent argument, with the exception that for whatever reason it’s about Becca having a court order against using a computer hooked up to the Internet, which Becca conceals by hiding it out the window. On the way to school, they get into an argument about their father, who disappeared and left Becca to be raised by her sister.
Jaime sneaks into her college class late, and they coincidentally enough happen to be discussing people enhancing their bodies through medical means. But she’s dating the professor, Will, who says he’s with her because she’s different and unplanned by his father. Upon meeting him for a date, she leaves her sister with her friends, essentially babysitters.
At dinner, Will asks her to go to Paris with him, and she lets him know she’s pregnant. He asks her to marry him, which makes perfect sense since they’ve been dating all of 5 months, 14 days. While driving home, he’s trying to pick out baby names… and then out of nowhere here comes the car crash we’ve been waiting for. As it turns out, the wreck wasn’t exactly what you would call accidental. Out of the car steps Sarah. Jaime’s still conscious but seriously injured and in need of massive reconstructive surgery. As luck would have it, her boyfriend is a doctor with the capability to give her bionic powers.
Afterwards, the military group responsible for the project calls a meeting to decide what to do with the “subject.” The concept of killing her is brought up, as is making her combat ready, to which Will is obviously opposed. In the meantime, they hold her captive, hoping she won’t realize they can’t possibly hold her captive. While evaluating her, they see she draws Sarah, who they thought they killed three years ago. Will helps Jaime to escape, and on the way home, she realizes just what she can do. Her initial reaction is freaking out, but she decides to accept it and test herself by jumping from one rooftop to the next.
Will is displeased when compared to his father. Jay later visits his father (Anthony Anthros, played by Mark Sheppard) in the slammer 1000 feet underground, in an attempt to figure out how Sarah’s still alive. He’s apparently unable to get a useful answer.
Sarah stops by the bar and makes sure Jaime knows she knows who she is and what she’s capable of. Upon leaving the bar, Jaime makes quick work of a thug who pulls a knife on her, stopping just short of killing him. Tough chicks kick ass. She doesn’t think so, though, and is afraid that she fought him without having control over what she was doing until she managed to stop herself.
She goes to see Will to find out what he knows, mentions the name Sarah Corvis, and immediately after, Will gets shot by Sarah, who seems tough until she sees Jay and takes off. Jaime chases after her and finds out that Sarah was the first bionic woman, who is slowly replacing her weak human parts. A tough chick fight ensues. Jaime starts off getting her ass kicked but eventually gets into the groove and dishes as well as she got.
At the end of the episode, after being threatened by Jonas Bledsoe (played by Miguel Ferrer, Dr. Garret Macy on Crossing Jordan), who’s apparently the head of this whole operation, her response is, “If we do this, whatever this is, we do it on my terms. If that’s not okay with you, I know what I’m capable of now, so you send whoever you send, and I’ll bury one guy after the next.”
We then close things off with Anthony getting out of jail.
So what did I think? The first episode, attempting to establish the basis for a story line, was at times all over the place and hard to follow. Not a particulary thrilling start, but this looks like it’s worth watching, so I look forward to seeing what the future episodes have in store.
Bionic Woman premieres on NBC Wednesday September 26th at 9/8c, but thanks to Amazon Unbox, the pilot is available to watch online for free. To download it, go to Amazon Unbox
The pilot definitely could have been better, but the premise, writers, and the cast are all great so I think the show will improve as it settles in over the next few episodes.
Yeah, I definitely think there’s very good potential in this series. Just a lot of explaining to do in the first episode.
the production of this show obviously ended!!
but the bionic woman pilot sucked!!!