A mysterious event has caused everyone in the world to lose consciousness at exactly the same moment.  Plane crashes, car crashes and other tragedies were responsible for twenty million deaths during the two minutes and seventeen seconds of the blackout.

Also during the Global Blackout, every man woman and child was given a flash forward to his or her life six months in the future.  An FBI investigation, headed by Asst. Director Stanford Wedeck (Courtney B. Vance) and agent Mark Benford (Joseph Fiennes), attempts to solve the mystery, as the world’s population wrestles with the choice of whether to embrace the fate they’ve seen or fight to change the future.

CRITIQUE

On the plus side, Flash Forward is an engrossing, well written, cleverly directed sci-fi drama with a congenial, very talented cast of players.  It’s the kind of addicting series that, like “24”, when one gets their hands on the full or half-season DVD set, you want to watch all of the episodes in one sitting.

Aside from Joseph Fiennes and Courtney B. Vance, the series is enhanced by the presence of Sonya Walger, as Fiennes’ doctor wife and John Cho and Christing Woods, playing Fiennes’ fellow FBI agents.

That said, as much as I hate to see creative people (or anybody) out of work, from a story standpoint, the series would be best served if it was cancelled at the end of the first season, providing the producers are given enough notice to allow them to wrap-up the all plotlines.

The problem with a series of this sort (i.e. one based upon a central mystery) is that, in order to keep it going over a long period of time, the creators have to pile enigma upon enigma so that, at some point, the plot becomes so convoluted that the viewer doesn’t really know what the hell is going on.  Often, enigmas are introduced, then get lost and are never resolved.

“24” makes it a point to resolve the primary storyline at the conclusion of each season.  Should Flash Forward be renewed for a second season, because of its basic premise, I’m not sure that it can do that.

Season One, Part One of Flash Forward contains the first ten episodes (on two discs) and, already, the plot is starting to go off on multiple tangents, introducing new conspiracies that, at this point, seem to have nothing really to do with the central mystery (i.e. what and who caused the blackout and why?).

When the focus is on the central mystery, the show moves along quite well, and it is riveting, but when it goes off on one of its secondary plotlines, it becomes ho-hum.

Good storytelling requires a well thought-out structure that makes steady progress toward its climax and conclusion.

Entertaining as they might be, shows like Flash Forward either “tread water” too much or take too many side trips that prevent them from meeting that criterion.

Hopefully, all outstanding mysteries will be resolved by the conclusion of this first season…and all the folks involved with go on to new productive assignments.

THE VIDEO

The widescreen picture is broadcast sharp.  There are no noticeable flaws.

THE AUDIO

The Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound is without problems.

THE EXTRAS

Creating Catastrophe, a 7-8 minute featurette that shows how the spectacular disaster aftermath of the Global Blackout was created.

Flash Forward: A Look Ahead, a featurette with, what appear to be, the first few scenes of Episode 11 of the series.

FINAL THOUGHT