TV series– The pretender

TV series– The pretender 

Score : 5/10 

Seasons & running years : 4, from 1996-2000

Additions: 2 tv-movies in 2001

Music: Several, see below. 

Country: USA

Language: English. Occasional dialogues in other languages.

Duration: 42 minutes X 86 episodes. 

Each tv-movie about 1h30

Writers:  Multiple (IMDB)
Created by : Steven Long Mitchel & Craig W. Van Sickle

When he was a boy, Jarod was kidnapped from his parents by a secret testing tacility known as the Center, located in fictional Blue cove, Delaware.  Through simulations, they taught him to hone and use his innate genius abilities to master any skill, and to Pretend, which means to become anone he wants to be for this process.

One day, he learns that the Center was using his simulations for destructive purposes. he escapes, using his talents, taking different jobs, impersonating doctors, law enforcement agents but also crooks, dealers, teachers and everything in-between, in order to help strangers he feels were wronged, all the whilst trying to find the truth about his parents, hiding and escaping from his pursuers from The Center. 

On first glance and during the 4 seasons it ran, The Pretender is a mix of scifi/fantasy and thriller, with a conspiracy twist. It has these aspects due the several facts:

• Jarod was filmed every day by the Center, throughout his life, and that the resulting videos are encoded on DSA's, which look like (real-life) mini-discs, and in these videos, you see editing made from multiple angles, a technology that wouldn't have been realistic to have back in the 1970's. 
• If Jarod had really been caught impersonating federal agents, doctors and police officers, he'd be arrested. 

Watching the show's first 3 seasons, I felt it had potential, even though I preferred to think of it in such manner as a fantasy, happening in the future instead of present late 1990's... I could see myself in Jarod as we share his need for answers and felt that his vigilantism was explained rather easily through his trauma and finding his quest to find his parents, as I myself had searched for part of my own family. But, as the show continued, and I finally saw it to its very end, I was disappointed as to the directions it took. 

The first two seasons barely had any religious allusions, in the third this became more and more present, in the fourth it was embedded into the main arcs ; Jarod would even help someone to meet the Pope... 

The show had definitely turned religious all over a sudden, making it as if it had always been ; adding mystical aspects, new relationships, siblings and twisted plots, and then concluded in two tv movies, and those were a massive train wreck to watch, as they veered gradually in the first and totally in the second, from the premise of conspiracy, into cursed scrolls, prophecies, secret societies, demon possessions and religious orders in some of the most convoluted stories I've ever seen. 

I find that during season 4, as the stories became more and more religiously driven and moving away from the main plots, all the whilst adding twists and writers forgetting horrendous acts of some of characters, never to conclude them with proper punishments, contrary to Jarod's pursuits of justice, even the acting suffered. I think Andrea Parker (Miss Parker) & Michael T. Weiss (Jarod) both phoned-in their acting in those late episodes, probably because they felt they didn't believe where the stories were going... 

The two tv-movies are the worse way to end any show, especially veering so far away from the original stories ; they are bad even as stand-alone, but especially as conclusions to 5 years of clues and opportunities. 

The best aspects of the show were  :

It's humanism
Low level of blood / graphic 

It's kind, sensitive hero 

its music composed by   John Debney (season one) ; Rick Patterson (season two and three) ; Velton Ray Bunch (season four) & Mark Leggett (season four, co-composer)

Main flaws, for me, were 

Some odd stories
Unclear path and roles of people working at the Center 
Attempts at creativity failing visually
Invented locations
& as many movies/shows, issues about female characters that aren't solely for this


But, the show deteriorated for me a lot for its ending, though The Pretender had initially spoken to me for many years, for my liking Jarod and most of the stories, even if I had to bend its in-story reality and to imagine the dates in the future, but having re-watched it recently, completing all those missing episodes, I find that its ending negates it and if I ever watch again, I'd have to stop before those tv-movies, and possibly early in season 4 when all the attempts at artistic camera work had failed more than succeeded, as well as their few episodes meant as nods and inspirations from others, but which didn't tend to work. 

Cast:



Michael T. Weiss, Andrea Parker, Patrick Bauchau, Jon Gries, Richard Marcus, Harve Presnell, Paul Dillon, Ryan Merriman, Alex Wexo, et al (check that IMDb link above for full) 

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The Pretender, in the media

There are only rare dvd editions, to my knowledge the French one, which either divides each season into 2 boxsets or combines them into 1 box per season, and the 2 tv-movies on one dvd, but the one I had bought was the US region 1 dvd boxsets for each season.

These dvd's are dual-layers, dual-sided, housed in slim dvd cases, and the entire thing in a box.

The last dvd had two episodes which weren't well coded, and thus I couldn't watch. I did so online as a last resort, and found that the first of these, Junk, was triggering my emetophobia, and the second, School Daze, had a rather negative message at the end, and of declining quality anyways.

The fact all discs are dual-sided is a big issue, as you augment risks of having bad marks and damage, and having to flip side instead of putting another disc. So, sure, you save space, but it's not very practical and not easy to know which side you are putting it unless you look closely at the rim to find this information.

All seasons are presented in 2.0 stereo English, with optional subtitles (English SDH, Spanish, French). 

DVd's have bonuses with featurettes, interviews, and occasional audio commentaries. I never checked the latter and had started some of the former, but now that my disappointment at the ending of the show, totally dropping some of the stories, their mystico-spiritual and religious overtones as the end approached, I am not sure that I'll check those other bonuses.