First off let me state a bias; I don’t really dig Amanda Peet. I don’t know why; maybe she’s never played a character that I found remotely appealing. Maybe I just don’t respect her talent. But for whatever reason she’s never been a selling point for me.
Well I really dug her in this role. I though that she nailed it. She was subdued, yet she drew my attention. And I didn’t really feel like it was a performance. Actually, I didn’t really feel like any of the actors were “acting” so I guess they were all in top form.
What I think that I really loved most about the show is that everyone feels like they existed before the show aired. The characters are very well developed (and I’m basing this strictly on the debut episode).
To compare it to another Monday show, Prison Break, what’s happened in the past really fleshes out the characters and doesn’t feel like a forced produce of hackneyed writing. Where on Prison Break the past only serves the story, here what’s happened before has you firmly convinced in the reality that is the show. Basically, this thing is way well written.
And for the record Judd Hirsh’s speech ranks a close second to Blake’s (from Glengarry Glen Ross. I’m a sucker for monologues (or near monologues).
