Jekyll - A Review

Tonight was BBCA’s premiere of the new series, Jekyll, and I watched both episodes. The premise is obvious from the title: a man has what appears to be a split-personality and his “darker side” comes out from time to time to go wenching, drinking, and killing. He blacks out and has no recollection of the events, but he is aware that he has this problem. As the show goes on, we find out that he is actually a descendant of the infamous Dr. Jekyll (of Robert Louis Stevenson fame) and the story was based on true events.

While definitely engrossing and a fair replacement for the vaunted Hex, there are some glaring problems with Jekyll. For one, you spend most of the show wondering what the hell is going on. Granted, it is interesting enough that you actually want to find out, but after only two episodes of it, it gets a little tiresome. The characters are interesting and there is some kind of conspiracy going on around him, but most of them tend to get killed-off before they make any real contribution to the story or the viewer becomes connected to them, so every time a new character is introduced after the first half-hour of the first episode, you are already dispassionately waiting to see how long they will last, as opposed to actually bothering to see who they are or what they are going to do, etc.

Two, there is some kind of something going on around him - apparently almost everyone but him knows about his alter-ego and is somehow looking to use it - but, um, like... what? I mean, you aren’t really sure who these people are, who is working with/for whom, what’s going on, who is whom, or what any of it means. Jekyll does a fair job of explaining these things before you just get sick of the whole thing and change the channel, but... well, it’s more annoying than intriguing.

The camerawork is deft and the pacing is good, and Hyde’s dialogue is really killer (pun fully intended). The overall concept and story moves faster than Hex did and is definitely interesting, even though things are already a bit telegraphed (he’s about to change, here come the Freddy Krueger quips, now the money-shot, now he’s dazed and confused - SCENE), but seeing as how most everything is already on the table after the second episode, I'm not sure it has the same depth as Hex. It was also cool to see the hottie brunette from Coupling as his estranged or ex-wife or whatever she is, but confusing as to the status of their relationship.

Overall, Jekyll is definitely worth watching and good enough fare for BBCA’s Supernatural Saturdays, but if you find your attention wandering, you aren’t alone. Nice enough replacement for our favorite witchy show, but it’s no Hex... of course, that’s a tall order.

This is one of those I'm really interested in hearing from everyone else on. Let me know what you think, but I suggest giving it a shot and hope it continues to get better.