This season, the critics Neil Genzlinger and Mike Hale are checking out favorite shows and seeing how they hold up. Previous entries in this series include posts on “New Girl,” “NCIS” and “Scandal.”
The big surprise in Sunday night’s season opener of “Revenge” – Victoria (Madeleine Stowe) is still alive! – was no surprise at all, since as she slowly made her way onto that doomed plane in the finale last season, she pretty much had “red herring” stamped on her. But ABC did have a few unexpected things to send our way in the Season 2 premiere: new haircuts for Daniel and Nolan.
Aside from that, though, the premiere felt a little disappointing: more like a reshuffling of last season’s cards than a re-energizing. Since Season 1 ended, Daniel (Josh Bowman) has apparently gotten over Emily (Emily VanCamp) enough to hook up with Ashley (Ashley Madewke), the brothers Jack (Nick Wechsler) and Declan (Connor Paolo) have switched their responsible/irresponsible hats, and Victoria has struck some kind of bargain with the white-haired man.
There have been lots of hints about a monstrous conspiracy that would make the framing of Emily’s father seem minor, but the premiere didn’t tell us much more about it. The focus was on Emily’s mother, whom we learned late last season might still be alive. We now know that she was committed to some kind of institution and disappeared, possibly with Victoria’s help. More to come, no doubt.
But this was a set-things-in-motion episode more than a revelatory one. So let’s talk about the hair. Every fan of this show knows that Gabriel Mann should have won the best-supporting-actor Emmy; without his Nolan, “Revenge” wouldn’t be half as interesting.
Perhaps someone told him he wasn’t buff enough to win an Emmy: when we first saw him Sunday night, he was in a boxing ring, toning up. But does he have the same appeal with the new, more staid haircut? Daniel, too, has been to the barber and is now looking less likeable and more businesslike, in keeping with the transformation being asked of his character. But Nolan is the key to this series. Is he less fun with the new do?
Oh, and also feel free to comment on whether Victoria should have stayed dead. Maybe that would have forced the writers to take the show to a new level. Sunday’s premiere, at least, seemed to leave it more or less where it was.
Loved the clam-cam, though. And the flash-forward opening — the same gimmick used in Season 1 — was tasty. We were given an image of what appeared to be Jack’s wrecked boat with a body inside, circa three months in the future, before the episode backed up to the start of the summer and things got down to business.
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