The NBC Sci-fi series, “The Event” is coming along nicely. I’m enjoying keeping up with it, and looking forward to its return at the end of the month. When I look back at the episodes we have so far, however, there is a glaring issue which rankles me.
One of the lead characters, Sean is a software engineer, who becomes involved in the twisting plot when his fiancé is kidnapped while the couple is vacationing. His story becomes the action-hero sub-plot which gives the story most of its explosions, gun fights, and chase-scenes, while the rest of the story is very talky.
The problem with this is that he doesn’t have a background which explains his super natural abilities to run, fight, and tactically plan his own victory and survival.
He’s also a hacker, and that part is okay, since we’ve established that he’s a software engineer, and in TV land this is enough to give him the ability to do pretty much whatever he wants to other people’s computers, no matter how impossible. It’s something we’ve all come to expect in the medium.
However, the only explanation we get for his physical abilities: One episode alludes to him having been on the swim team. This explains how he was confident enough to dive into the ocean and rescue a man from drowning in the very first episode, but that’s the extent of it.
The most perplexing moment comes while the fiancé is being held captive. I think I didn’t really notice it the first time because it’s such a strong TV trope that it barely registered, but the fiancé tells the bad guys that they are going to be in big trouble because Sean is looking for her, she just knows that he is, and nothing is going to get in his way of finding her.
Seriously? I mean if she was engaged to a Federal ass-kicking-agent, or a UFC champion, or even an ambulance driver from the tough part of town who takes a Karate class on Tuesdays, these words might be reasonable, but this guy is a Software Engineer from the suburbs.
He had a tough family life, sure. He played a sport in high school, okay. None of that adds up to “He will find a way to defeat you all and rescue me.”
Of course he did fight his way to her, and bring her out, but what made her think that he could?
It makes me wonder what is in their past that gives her such confidence in his abilities. Will something be revealed in a later episode which explains how Sean became such a badass?
Did he spend some tough time in prison? Was he trained in a special secret military organization?
The audience hasn’t gotten much of the story about how the two characters met, so there might be something to that, but as it stands this character has been lost to me.
As much as I like to see Geeks being heroes, it’s going to be difficult for me to take his adventure seriously until I see a bit more of his background.
