Pete Messum Reviews...

On Wednesday the 4th June 2014, the final episode of The Tomorrow People was shown on E4. I'd been catching up on the series ready for the finale, and I ultimately felt underwhelmed by the conclusion, but interested in what was being set-up. The first thing I liked was that Jedikiah showed real signs of compassion for his brother, but somehow the jealously aspect was mostly forgotten. He got powers, and then broke Roger out from Ultra, only to lose his powers just as he reached his brother. This could have been a great villain twist, but wasn't. However, in the end he uses Roger's powers to give John his Tomorrow People abilities once again, but with the cost being that John doesn't remember Cara and the others. His mission is to recruit the Tomorrow People from the lair, but of course the series was cancelled so we'll probably never see what happened next. Then comes the hate...one of The Tomorrow People (whose name I can't remember; the blonde woman) irrita...

No more from The Tomorrow People Sorry for the delays with this post folks, but I'd best explain why my reviews of the US series The Tomorrow People have stopped. I've watched the series up to about Episode 19 (I think) and overall I've been disappointed with it. The Tomorrow People isn't exactly a 'fun' series, so when a bad episode comes along, it really is bad. The latest episodes haven't been bad per say, but I'm getting very tired of the constant 'drama' elements between the characters. Stephen is a character I've tried to like, but he's getting very arrogant and annoying that at the end of the last episode I watched, not only had he ignored all help from his friends whom he has trusted before but goes along with the plan of the man who has done horrible and evil things. Jedikiah is a character who's difficult to trust, but surely if John trusts him, Stephen should? I'm not even going to bother with the ever-confusing ele...

This episode provided the most interesting mystery for the series in a long time, and as a result it gave the episode a crime drama feel, especially as it all resolves around a murder. After last episode's shocking cliff-hanger, Stephen is explaining to his mum (or mom, if you live in America) about his important work at Ultra, while the family takes John in after his exile last episode. This shows John again at his height, and Cara at her lowest. She seems to be unable to have full control over the Tomorrow People and after this episode's ending, I'm hoping someone else takes over soon. Really soon. For most of this episode, Cara and Russell seem to be working against Stephen and Ultra, which causes some friction between both parties. John seems to be caught in the middle, enjoying it all. I won't spoil this episode, but the ending was a fantastic twist for the series. You can kinda see it coming in the final scene, but it is truly a brilliant reveal. Overall, the ...

The Tomorrow People has gone on many ups and downs over the past twelve episodes. At points when I wanted to stop watching the series, it would come back with an amazing and fantastic episode. Then, there would either be an okay or pretty poor episode, putting me off again. This episode follows Cassie – daughter of the Founder – which allows for some interesting plot twists. While the revelation about her being the Founder’s daughter may be a rather predictable twist just to keep the audience hooked into the opening titles (and on E4, the first advert break), somehow it makes sense. Easily my favourite scene in the episode is when the Founder confronts Jedikiah. Their conversation shows their relationship with each other brilliantly and how both, despite being horrible excuses for people, have their own weak spots. Their reactions when Jedikiah mentions Cassie are priceless. Jedikiah’s smile of victory and smugness and the Founder’s of “I’ll get you next time” demonstrate both actors’...

Stephen seems to have enemies all around him. He does not trust his mum’s boyfriend, Ultra keep betraying him, and for this episode he’s dealing with both of these issues. Our main character goes on a camping trip with his mum, brother and his mum’s boyfriend Peter – whom he suspects to be a Tomorrow Person – and assigns John to look after Astrid, as he’s sure Ultra has found out about her. This episode shows Stephen’s paranoia – and why he is right not to trust everyone. However, his paranoia bites him in the backside when he tries to get Peter to show off his powers, incidentally almost killing the guy! Peter is simply human, so who did all that strange stuff...? Astrid’s singing audition goes horribly wrong when Ultra tries to kill her, and – when he rescues her – John, and a section of the episode focuses on Astrid looking after John after her is shot. It’s clear that John and Cara are becoming even more separated, and now he’s siding with Stephen more. Overall, the episode had...

Urgh... After last episode’s disappointment, we’re given this: a clichéd mess of a story. Normally this would be OK, but this story has been done so many times before, and has been done better. While it answers questions about other gangs of Tomorrow People and what becomes of the kid after the last episode (I think she has a name, but is so forgettable that I can’t be bothered to even look it up) as well as John’s job for the team now. One aspect I liked about the episode was John. He started off as a rather archetypal and dull character, but has grown on me. The twists with his character have ironically made him more likeable, and his interactions with other characters are fantastic. Then we have Mr I’m-an-evil-gang-leader-who-knew-one-of-the-good-guys-cliché that goes up against Cara. This only works as it shows what became of Cara once she left home and how she copes as a leader. However, her defeat of Mr I’m-an-evil-gang-leader-who-knew-one-of-the-good-guys-cliché brings up s...

Urgh...I thought this episode would be amazing. If this really was the mid-season opener in the US, then what a disappointment! The episode sees Stephen trying to work out where his father’s body is, and follows Cara as she tries to break some Tomorrow People from the Citadel and becomes the leader of her species. Cara is first of all not suited for this, and it’s going against what I liked about her. John gets a chance to loosen up but the idea was that he was meant to be a bit tight. The Citadel sub-plot is weak and doesn’t go anywhere. “Let’s introduce this young kid!” “We need an evil bloke!” “What if this evil bloke, isn’t evil?!” “Can we kill this bloke off now and keep the kid?” The episode has nothing going for it. Had it not been for the fact that there was no break here in the UK, I would have been really tempted to stop watching. It doesn’t know what story it wants to tell, and it’s clear where it will go in the grand scheme of things, so why not focus on what will do...

John is a prisoner in Ultra. The Founder is trying to work out exactly what happened to Jedikiah. The secret of what happened to Roger Price is out. Well, if this was a British TV series, this would probably be the plot for the Series One finale, but this is a US TV series, where most shows are 22 episodes a season (known as ‘series’ in the UK). This is only the mid-season finale. John’s (inevitable) escape from Ultra seems to take up very little of the story, but is cleverly done all the same. Jedikiah has been blackmailed by Cara to release John or his girlfriend will die, so his involuntary involvement works very well. After what he learns from last week’s episode, Jedikiah checks the security tapes from Cara’s injection and it seems Stephen injected her with another serum. Stephen manages to bluff his way out of this by saying it was because he’s in love with Cara, which Jedikiah understands. After all, he says, he fell in love with a Tomorrow Person. Stephen realizes that t...

After several episodes of (important) character development, we now seem to be back to the actual plot of the series: finding Roger Price, Stephen’s father and leader of the Tomorrow People. Sadly this doesn’t mean Ultra is out of the picture. After a mission goes wrong, Russell accidentally brings Jedikiah back with him to the subway station, where all of the found Tomorrow People are hiding. You can tell this episode is going to be interesting from that premise. The main crooks of the story are based on Jedikiah’s relationship with the Tomorrow People, particularly with John. Jedikiah is in possession of knowledge that would sever John’s leadership over the Tomorrow People, thus giving him a bargaining tool, but Cara has uncovered the secret of Jedikiah’s girlfriend, who just so happens to be a Tomorrow Person. Meanwhile Ultra are searching for Jedikiah, and that is when the Founder comes in. Yeah, if you thought Jedikiah was one messed-up villain, the Founder takes the bisc...

So, after the ending to last week’s  installment , you’d think that The Tomorrow People  wouldn't  tackle two impossible-to-blend story-lines together! So they do, and thus you have ‘Limbo’. John is particularly angry after what happened between Stephen and Cara in Episode 6 and he shows his anger, though never losing his cool. Luke Mitchell is very subtle in his performance, but you can see his hatred of Stephen beginning to build, to the point where he’s tempted to just let him die. Cara is beginning to see the effects of last week and is trying to prevent a serious fight between Stephen and Cara, sticking with John and leaving Stephen saying that what happened  shouldn't  have happened. In the meantime, Stephen’s powers are cut-off by Jedikiah before he does anything stupid with them. Of course, he already has, and a fancy bracelet is his punishment. He gets in serious trouble for a party and then mind-reading Astrid - who now knows about his powe...

After five episodes of Russell being no more than a likeable supporting character, at long last he gets more of a main role when he and John go to attend his father’s funeral. It begins to become clear what lead Russell to the Tomorrow People and his story is genuinely upsetting, with some fantastic acting from Aaron Yoo in these scenes. However, it is only half of the episode. Yes, we have another, less interesting half with Stephen and Cara tracking down a break-out, who turns out to be...Darcy’s sister! Yeah, Darcy...the character no one remembers the name of who works for Ultra. Right... Actually, this basic concept is great, and pays off well, only it leads to a romance blooming between Cara and Stephen. While I’m not going to bother with the fact that Stephen is meant to be a 16-year old teenager and Cara is a woman in her twenties, it feels oddly forced and came out too soon. Some things need more time to build. In Firefly, Mal and Inara don’t even get together in the end a...

For the fifth episode of The Tomorrow People, it’s clear that tensions are beginning to rise for the main characters, with Stephen trying to remain on good terms with his Uncle and the Homo-superior getting restless. Stephen is interrogated by Ultra’s hierarchy, and suddenly he begins to worry that he has leaked information to the big boss, as Cara, Russell and most of the Tomorrow People go off to a party – one that John is particularly against. However, Ultra knows this and Jedakiah in his nice family-man ways brings Stephen along to see them get slaughtered at a club, while Astrid begins to get suspicious of Stephen and what he gets up to. It’s a tense episode, although it feels a little too predictable, with one shock twist and one minor twist that fuels Cara’s rage a bit too much for Stephen’s liking. The tension between John and Cara is definitely building, but it will ultimately out in something. 8/10

The Tomorrow People has been an interesting series to review, with characters developing each and every episode. After a story focussed on Cara, it seems only right for the next one to be focussed on John. With yet another opening set in the past, the episode opens with a young John as he is recruited by Jedakiah for a new programme of Ultra’s. Meanwhile, in the present an old friend of John’s (and former employee of Ultra’s) has returned to seek vengeance against his former friend and Jedakiah. As the episode develops, more and more information is leaked out as to what exactly happened between the three characters. The title of the episode is ‘Kill or Be Killed’, and that is essentially the story line. McCrane (John’s friend) is able to kill after being experimented on by Ultra, and by the end, we also learn that another member of the Tomorrow People was the same as well. It’s a concept that the series has been hinting at since Episode 1, and it works very well in this episode...

The Tomorrow People has followed the clichés and tropes of many US Television series over its first two episodes, but for its third episode it was able to get a real emotion across to its audience in an episode that seems to be much more focussed on the darker elements of this world that has been created. The focus of the episode is mostly on Cara, who is approaching the fifth anniversary of her breakout, which is causes problems with her psychic abilities and emotionally. Peyton List is amazing in the role, and the upsetting and slightly chilling background story of her breakout is very well made, and she manages to get across the horrible nature of her life, on both her human life and her life as one of the Tomorrow People. However, John sends Stephen out with a mission – the plant a device that can connect Ultra’s network to Tim the supercomputer, so that they can find Tomorrow People before Ultra. Sadly, partly due to Cara’s state of mind, the device is located and John, Cara ...

You know you’ve got a great villain when he’s the main character’s Uncle – jealous and vengeful against his brother’s abilities to the extent that he’ll wipe out his brother’s entire species, and that is what Jedikiah Price is. Stephen is trying to get to grips with his new-found abilities while trying to persuade Cara and John that working for Ultra is a good idea, while trying to get inside Ultra itself. This second episode carries on the threads from the first, and a previously sequence at the beginning appears to be a great help for those who weren’t paying attention to Episode 1. It’s clear that Jedikiah will stop at nothing to annihilate the Tomorrow People, to the extent that he locates break-outs and uses brain-washed Tomorrow People to hunt them down, so that Ultra can either kill or destroy their powers. This proves to be the case when their next target is a teenage criminal, of whom Stephen must try and protect but not draw attention to himself. Worse still, Jedikiah ha...

Loosely based upon the 1973 ITV series of the same name, The Tomorrow People follows Stephen Jameson – a teenager who is having sleep-walking problems. However, he is soon told that he isn’t sleep-walking at all, but teleporting in his sleep to various different places. He also feels he is going mad when he hears voices in his head, and his life seems to be a living nightmare. That is until he meets the Tomorrow People – an evolved species of homo-sapiens (known as homo superior) – that he is a member of. The Tomorrow People posses the three T’s – Telepathy, Teleporting and Telekinesis. They are lead by John Young, Cara Coburn and Russell Kwon, who locate members of their race in teenage years when they “break out”. The Government wants them annihilated though, and thus Dr. Jedikiah Price enters Stephen’s life – a man intent on getting rid of them. This episode has little of a story to it, and it definitely feels like set-up, rather much like the first episode of Firefly. The ...