Category: Wayward Pines
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There are a lot of stories you can only tell in sci-fi. For instance, only with time travel can you have young mom Kacey Rohl wake up after two thousand years of cryo-sleep and be paired off with her unknowing son, Tom Stevens, now grown up. Yuck. It’s unclear why you’d want to tell this…
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Wayward Pines, the town, is in dire straits. The creatures outside the wall have destroyed their food supply, and they’re out of MREs. They’ll only survive another thirty days (or, more precisely, two episodes). So teen dictator Tom Stevens decides everyone’s going back in cryo-sleep for fifty-seven years or whatever. Only Djimon Hounsou then discovers…
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So, with “Wayward Pines” entering the season’s final act—there are only two more episodes after this one–it’s unclear where they’re going, but it’s clear they aren’t going to get there gracefully. This episode’s all about female creature Rochelle Okoye escaping and wreaking havoc around town, including leaping between the buildings on Main Street. There’s also…
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After an inglorious character arc in the regular story, Djimon Hounsou finally gets his own episode, albeit a flashback one. Turns out Hounsou’s job—before “Wayward Pines: Season Two”—was to wake up every twenty years and take care of the people sleeping in cryo-pods for two thousand years. He also tested the soil, played chess with…
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Vincenzo Natali directs this episode. I’ve never seen any of his movies, but he’s far and away the best director of the season so far. He even knows how to do a Toby Jones cameo—as few lines as possible, as short of a scene as possible. Jones shows up at the beginning for a flashback…
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Toby Jones is back this episode, which has a flashback subplot about how architect Nimrat Kaur actually designed Wayward Pines, the town, and lied to husband Jason Patric about it when he asked a few episodes ago. Jones looks much older in the flashback than he did last season on the show when he was…
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It’s like “Wayward Pines” heard my complaints there weren’t enough bad performances on the regular and felt the need to deliver. This episode features the return of Tim Griffin from season one, who was an entirely personality-free white man and goes on to one-up him with Josh Helman, who’s got even less personality and might…
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“Wayward Pines: Season Two” really is committed to the bit. There’s a scene where schoolmarm, monster researcher, and psychotherapist Hope Davis tells a group of girls there’s nothing wrong with them not having their periods yet. They just don’t get to participate in the Davis-supervised orgies with the other thirteen-year-olds yet. Not in those words,…
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Djimon Hounsou arrives this episode as the town farmer. He’s supposedly a protege of first-season villain Toby Jones, though there’s no explanation why he wasn’t around before. It stands out, of course, because Jones’s villain was pretty plainly racist; the whole project—in the first season—was about breeding white babies. In the second season, the show’s…
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The season two premiere opens with Charlie Tahan, set up as the new lead in last season’s finale, narrating a recap of the first season. It’s a terrible recap, writing-wise. It does not bode well. But then the first real scene is Jason Patric in Hawaii, in the middle of a spat with wife Nimrat…
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This season finale has four credited writers. First, there are the Duffer Brothers, Matt and Ross, who certainly haven’t been credited on the show’s worst episodes. Then there’s show creator Chad Hodge, who has been credited on the show’s worst episode. And finally, there’s source novel series author Blake Crouch, who’s had some credits and…
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Second-to-last episode of the season, and it turns out “Wayward Pines” has waited this long to introduce the fascist teenagers who want to shoot the normies. Tom Stevens plays the leader. He’s both too much and just the right amount of despicably intense. Unfortunately, the show doesn’t really know what to do with him—introducing him…
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Tim Hunter directs this episode, which is notable for a couple reasons. First, it means he’s been directing Matt Dillon for almost as long as Dillon’s wife on “Pines,” Shannyn Sossamon, has been alive. Hunter directed Dillon in 1982’s Tex (but also wrote Dillon’s 1979 Over the Edge); Sossamon was one when Edge came out.…
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Thanks to the insurgency plotline—and who gets put in danger—this episode’s more compelling than most. Also, there’s less Toby Jones, which helps a whole bunch. Plus, Melissa Leo stops acting hacky around Matt Dillon, another plus. The episode begins with Dillon telling Shannyn Sossamon about how they live two thousand years in the future, and…
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“Wayward Pines” makes a lot more sense now. Not because of the revelations in this episode, but because of what’s better and what’s worse. Well, who’s better and who’s worse. Unfortunately, the show’s got no idea when it’s good or what makes it good. Also, can’t forget–the racism’s intentional. More on that delightful aspect in…
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There’s so much going on this episode I didn’t even realize Carla Gugino isn’t in it. It’s a brand new day in “Wayward Pines,” with Shannyn Sossamon starting as a realtor—working with caricature male chauvinist pig Michael McShane, which is actually fine; the show couldn’t even manage caricatures before. Son Charlie Tahan is still in…
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Okay, so it’s way too little, probably way too late, but “Wayward Pines” might rally into mediocrity. This episode plays like the first episode after a pilot, meaning the first three episodes of the season, with the movie stars and former movie stars, were just the setup. Now we’ve got the actual show, which seems…
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Despite a gory exit last episode, Juliette Lewis is still in the opening titles. It initially made me wonder if “Pines” is going to kill off a main actor every week and just leave them in the titles to remind who’s already gone. She shows up for a moment later, no lines; I wonder if…
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Once upon a time, Reed Diamond appeared on a show, but just the pilot. Even though he was billed in the regular cast, his death was meant to shock viewers. “Wayward Pines” waits until the second episode to kill off one of its “regular” cast (though if the show’s just going to keep going killing…
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My favorite part of this episode is when M. Night Shyamalan’s name comes up for the director credit because there have already been so many terrible shots, it seemed like it had to be a named terrible. Shyamalan’s direction throughout the episode will be godawful, both with his composition and the direction of the actors.…
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