Defying Gravity

I don't usually read the reviews of new shows. I tend to watch the first episode of most everything if there is something about it that I think I would find interesting. I hate it when a show gets away from me due to to much pre-release hype or a slow start that keeps any buzz from forming until one or two seasons have already passed. Anything that is praised by the critics tends to be the kiss of death for me. I never got on the 'Lost' bandwagon having being burned before by shows like 'Alias' and the 'X-Files', who both failed to resolve the mysteries of their complicated mythologies. (In the case of the 'X-Files' that was after 8 years and 2 movies.) I figure since 'Lost' is ending after five seasons I can go back to the beginning and watch the entire show in one shot once it ends. I think if I would have gotten on the weekly/yearly schedule It would have drove me crazy by now. I am also still smarting from that 'blackout' ending of the 'Sopranos'. 'Burn Notice' and 'The Wire' slipped under my radar despite their core of rabid fans. Now I am one of those rabid fans of both shows. 'True Blood' gets alot of good press so maybe I will try Season One soon and watch it all at once to see for myself. 'Defying Gravity' is a new show about a 6 year space mission to 7 planets in our Solar System. When I heard the show was pitched as 'Grey's Anatomy in space' I was not excited. I have grown to loath 'Grey's' with the passion of a million white hot suns. The year is 2047 and the Antares is ready to launch with her 8 member crew. Ron Livingston plays Maddux Donner and is the lead actor in the series. Trust me you have seen him in alot of TV shows but this is the first time I think that he is the lead and he is a solid actor for the role. We see in flashbacks that he and his fellow astronaut (Makik Yoba, played by Ted Show) were forced to leave two people on Mars during a previous mission. That decision (which was not his) has haunted him since then and put him in conflict with the Capcom of the Antares mission (Ty Olsson played by Rollie Crane), who WAS the one responsible for forcing them to launch off of Mars, costing the lives of the two. Donner is not on the Antares until by a quirk of fate or design (we don't know yet - its one of the mysteries about this mission) he is brought back on the mission as its Chief Engineer. There are old romances and rivalries between members of the crew and Capcom Olsson has secrets that for some reason are known only by a few, including the new Mission Commander (Yoba) and his wife (Karen Leblanc played by Eve Weller-Shaw) who works with Capcom Olsson and is married to new Commander Ted. Even by episode 2 we have an idea that the main secret involves an alien force they call 'BETA'. I can only assume that the entire mission has much to do with the alien returning to Venus. They make many references to 'it' making 'choices'. 'BETA' seems to be able to make people do or think what it wants and has given the crew both visual and auditory hallucinations so far. I like the flashback technique they use to show the crew from their first day of Astronaut training. This flushes out much of the back story and relationships between the characters. When we see them on the mission its nice to see how their history together plays out. Tricky to do but successful so far. If the pilot is any indication of the quality of the season to come then I think I am on board for the ride. I especially like the statue of the Hindu god 'Ganesha' (the god of new beginnings) who was affixed to the outside of the ship by the former mission engineer who 'BETA' did not see fit to allow on the mission. Its how we got Donner on board in the first place. The show is produced by Canada, the US and Germany.