Past Is Prologue
Episode 1 of 4400 begins with a young woman named Shanice preparing for work. Only, she’s suddenly whisked up along with a whole different group of people as they’re thrown into Belle park some time in the future. Now, some of these people have been missing for years, while others seem to have just been thrown into this time stream with no rhyme or reason.
Looking to get to the bottom of this phenomenon is parole officer Keisha Taylor. She shows up at work and is thrown straight into the thick of this situation. Along with a whole group of other social workers, she’s tasked with figuring out who these men and women are. However, much like the original series, these people are not as simple as they appear to be.
Keisha is pretty bullish and she kicks out at her colleague Jharrel for taking down the flexiglass before the interviews. Of course COVID makes an appearance here (thanks CW) as Keisha reminds him they’re still in quarantine.
Meanwhile a protest gets underway outside where a police officer gets close to touching one of the protestors. A fellow protester, Logan, manages to stop him though. “There seems to be a pattern among people who look a lot like you,” Sneers the young woman, as Logan laughs it off and agrees.
Meanwhile, Keisha and Jharrel have interviewed a fair few people and are no closer to finding out what’s going on. And out of the thousands, how many people have been questioned? 15. Brilliant.
There’s more strange occurrences outside the interviews though, including Claudette learning she has rapidly healing wounds and Shanice Murray skipping out and heading home.
Now, it turns out Logan is actually Shanice’s old boyfriend. When Shanice shows up at his door, she sees her daughter Mariah who instantly recognizes her, despite 16 years having passed now. In the time that she disappeared, Logan has moved on now. Police come racing to the scene and take her away in handcuffs, as Logan admits she left him a note. This big, elaborate scene with the police is all Keisha’s doing, which Jharrel is quick to point out as he questions her humanity.
In the wake of this, a whistle-blower leaks information about the 4400 being held in the US. The Pentagon are working on this situation too, trying to find a solution, but right now it’s difficult to know what to think.
The Episode Review
Well, this is nowhere near as good as the original 4400. Then again, this is the CW so we should have known, eh? The premise itself is pretty interesting and the idea of revamping this show and focusing more on the powers, along with the marginalized members of society, is actually quite a good idea. Unfortunately it’s done in the most haphazard and clumsy way possible.
The show has a really bad tendency of reminding us repeatedly of current social issues, with every 5 minutes throwing out another quip about how terrible police officers are, talking about “these people” when referencing whites and even throwing in COVID references too. That’s a shame because some of these characters are actually quite likable, despite the shaky acting, but the writing is horrible.
Ultimately 4400 is yet another show produced in the west that’s more interesting in telling a message than telling a story. Let’s hope the rest of the season picks up but based on this showing, it doesn’t look likely.
An unnecessary, poor attempt at a remake; 4400 will need to improve its scripts drastically to keep people tuning in week after week.
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Episode Rating
(1.5)