Title: Jack & Bobby
Network: WB
Starring: Christine Lahti (as Grace McCallister), Matt Long (as Jack McCallister), Logan Lerman (as Bobby McCallister), Jessica Pare (as Courtney Benedict), Edwin Hodge (as Marcus Ride), John Slattery (as Peter Benedict)
Timeslot: Sundays, 9/8c (premieres September 12th)
As with the onset of most new seasons of television in recent memory, viewers are going to be flooded with a deluge of new shows designed to steal them from aging or departed programs. The majority of these shows will not last; they will be panned by critics, shunned by viewers and mercy killed to make way for more of the same by mid-season.
Already the negative buzz has begun on many shows set to debut over the course of the next month, but a notable a exception, a show that has received a tremendous amount of praise in advance reviews is the WB’s Jack & Bobby. The network even had enough confidence in the vehicle to pick it up for thirteen episodes back in May, a month before most networks announce their fall lineups. I was fortunate enough to be sent an advance copy of the pilot by Brad Meltzer, New York Times best-selling author, burgeoning comic book creator (hence why he would take notice on yours truly, we met briefly at the San Diego Comic Con) and co-writer and co-creator of the show along with Steve Cohen. Having seen the initial forty-five minutes (no commercials, silly) of this latest venture into creating a venerable television animal I can safely say this: this baby is going to more than live up to the hype.
The premise of the show is different than what you would expect from the WB, a network known for its coming of age “dramadies” and third tier reality shows. The beginning and end of each segment take place in 2049 and are shot documentary style with various friends and colleagues talking about the President of the United States. The actual segments introduce Jack & Bobby McCallister, two brothers, as well as their single mother Grace; the catch is that one of these two boys will grow up to be the President in question.
Much of the advertising campaign for the show has focused on the “which one will it be?” gimmick, but as co-producer Greg Berlanti (also creator of the WB’s Everwood) told the Washington Post in June: “the show doesn’t hinge on who becomes president as much as how that president becomes who he is.” I’ll go ahead and let you in on a little secret: we find out which boy becomes president by the end of the pilot. Part of me wishes they had dragged it out a little longer, but I both see the impracticalities and limitations of working from such a gimmick and after having seen the pilot I also appreciate where Berlanti is coming from as I found myself far more interested in the characters than the question of which one became president.
The most compelling moments of the show lie in the interactions between the three McCallisters. Christine Lahti brings tremendous depth, heart and realism to the tough role of Grace McCallister, a single mother and “hip” professor at the local college who foists her aggressive liberal opinions on her sons and retreats to marijuana as an escape from life’s daily pressures. This was a case of quality casting (despite Lahti also being married to co-producer Thomas Schlamme, of West Wing fame) as Lahti is far more believable when she talks about the hardships of raising and providing for two boys on her own than a younger flavor of the month actress would have been. Grace pushes the rebellious Jack (Matt Long) to the side and pampers outgoing younger brother Bobby (Logan Lerman) to the point of smothering his social skills.
Long is intense as well as cool as Jack, a charismatic and popular track star who knows what he wants and goes after it. When he’s at school, Jack is untouchable, but when it comes to dealing with his family, the chinks in his armor show. Jack and Grace’s explosive confrontations make for the most powerful parts of the show, while he alternates between barely tolerating his eccentric younger brother and wanting to show him tough love. Lerman is extremely likeable as nerdy Bobby, an asthmatic who wears a helmet while playing video games and wants to start a space club; more importantly, he realistically portrays an awkward thirteen year old with ease, all smiles one minute and bowing to peer pressure because he gets made fun of the next.
But no one actor or character steals the show; the relationships between them are what really matter. The three actors have do a tremendous job of gelling as a “family;” from the first interactions between them, there is no doubt that Jack & Bobby are brothers, while both boys have a unique relationship with their mother that makes for great television.
On the surface, many of the scenes do seem like a Dawson’s Creek retread, but as they develop, the writers and actors shatter those trappings and create a very mature yet relatable look at the hardships of being a high school student or a family. Watching this episode, I saw many of the moments coming before they occurred, but they were so well executed and poignant that I didn’t mind and enjoyed them all the same; since the segments set in the future reveal much of what will ultimately happen to the family, it will be important for the show to maintain this quality.
The supporting characters were not terribly well developed (understandable given that this is the pilot episode), but the actors in these roles showed great potential for growth as the show continues. Jessica Pare matched Long’s fire as Courtney Benedict, the (to borrow a term from Not Another Teen Movie) uniquely rebellious girl whom Jack finds himself attracted to, but much of her character remains a frustrating enigma. Edwin Hodge does well as comic relief in the form of Marcus, Jack’s jock buddy. John Slattery rounds out the cast as Courtney’s father, Peter, the new president of the college Grace works at who surprises her by being a decent guy after she had him pegged as a “money grubbing whore.”
Cohen & Meltzer have said that the concept for Jack & Bobby grew in large part out of response to presidential candidates like George W. Bush, Al Gore and John Kerry: men who seem like they were groomed from birth to be President. The co-creators wanted to hearken back to the ideal that anybody with a strong belief system and upbringing could be president, regardless of their lineage and education. “Making it anyone’s game is what makes America great,” Meltzer said in the Post article back in June, “Everyone can relate to that.”
Jack & Bobby succeeds in large part because it’s just a charming show; it wins you over. The characters have depth and their relationships are real. I cared more about Jack, Bobby and Grace than I did the presidential angle, but the well-timed “documentary” segments reminded me that there was a bigger concept behind what I was watching, and that set it apart from just being a well-written, well-acted family drama. Cohen & Meltzer succeed in creating a work that makes you feel better about the American value system than you probably have in the past several election years. After one episode, Jack & Bobby has me hooked; I already know what point A and point B are, but I can’t wait to learn more about the journey that takes place between the two.
Overall Rating: 8.5 out of 10
(Ben Morse was ably assisted in the writing of this review by his girlfriend, Megan)
