I said that the next blog will be about the Fighter or about the Golden Globes, but I actually forgot that I saw the premiere of the new FX series Lights Out , so I just wanna share my thoughts on that episode with you since it really hits the topic of the Fighter (review will be up by tomorrow!).
For those of you newer heard about Lights out I am gonna summarize the general plot here and then dip into my thoughts about the actual stuff that is going on, on the screen.
Lights Out is the story of the retired former heavyweight champion Patrick "Lights" Leary , who had to retire after a vicious championship fight against his rival. His wife forced him to retire and for the sake of the marriage he agrees. Five years later the actual series actions starts showing Lights in the actual environment as a retired boxer. No one really gives a shit about him, he really has no big name and no fame left, but he aint realize that. To earn some money he is managing a Gym and goes to certain happenings for a couple of extra bucks.
Thats the main structure of the first episode.
To be honest I haven´t expected it to be a good series, coz I thought the boxing type of series are pretty much milked by all the boxing movies that are going on, but the series has some potential in my opinion cause there is not only the struggle of money involved here but also struggle with childs, wife and certain moral issues that need to be settled, so the series really has a lot of plot-strings to work with which could make this series a really good thing.
When I first watched it I was not that hyped about the show, but after a couple of minutes into the pilot I really felt satisfied and actually thrilled to see what the writers have in store for the pilot. I like pilots a lot in general because I thing you can lay it out there which direction you wanna go with the series. In the case of Lights Out there are several directions that can be choosen, because the pilot is really loaded. A possible comeback is teased, a threatening disease is mentioned, family issues are shown with his kids growing up, lies are established, money needs are there and last but not least an immoral job to earn quite some money is shown, so really a lot to work with.
The performance of the actors and actress is pretty solid, lots of characters are introduced (usual for a pilot) and non of the characters really leave a bad impression. The series needs Holt McCallany (Lights) to perform well and he did a good job in the pilot so there is really no reason to complain about that. Don´t know if his performance can actually improve to really get recognized for awards or so, but it is a solid level to work with that he has established!
Couple of other things to mention. I like the flashback in the lies, that totally turned around some stuff and I think it was a cool thing. Since I am a Scorsese Fan the flashbacks are always working for me. In this real case here I thing the boxing past flashback is setting up to be a regular thing since his boxing career is not finalized in a way. And I hope the other flashbacks in the lies will be a big part of the series, coz they really emphasized the ending. You had some thoughts about what happend but the flashbacks really solved it, you had to stay tuned until the final minute and thats how it´s supposed to be!
So I really liked the pilot and I will continue watching the series cause I thing a lot of potential is in it. If the writers play their cards right and are not trying to force it too hard (like totally overloading the episodes with 5 different strings all involving Lights or so) it can very well be an entertaining series to watch!
Rating-wise I would give the pilot a 4 out of 5! (Series only 5 points because of the lenght)
Hope you enjoyed the second review...the Fighter will be next, followed by the Golden Globes! Stay tuned!
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