WonderCon 2015: Wayward Pines
WonderCon is here and while the high profile slate seems a lot lighter than normal (too many cons these days I suppose), there are still some worthwhile panels this year. One of them was for the upcoming Fox miniseries Wayward Pines. If you have been wondering where Wayward Pines is, don’t worry, so have I. The show screened its pilot episode at Comic-con last year, but has been MIA ever since. Now we know this M. Night Shyamalan mystery series will be premiering in May, which is good, because based on the pilot episode, there is a lot of promise here.
Here’s the official panel description to set up the show for you:
Based on Blake Crouch’s international bestselling series of books and brought to life by suspenseful storyteller M. Night Shyamalan, Wayward Pines is a 10-episode, intense psychological thriller, starring Academy Award nominee Matt Dillon as a secret service agent on a mission to find two missing federal agents in the bucolic town of Wayward Pines, ID. Every step closer to the truth makes him question if he will ever get out of Wayward Pines alive. The show was developed for television by Chad Hodge and executive-produced by Donald De Line, Ashwin Rajan, Hodge, and Shyamalan. Chad Hodge wrote and M. Night Shyamalan directed the premiere episode. An insightful Q&A will follow the screening.
So with that in mind, the WonderCon panel did feature a screening of the premiere episode and I have to say I really enjoyed it. It certainly comes out as the product of a post-Lost world, even down to beginning with an unconscious white guy in a suit waking up and trying to figure out where he is. Kidding aside (not really), the show was quite enjoyable in the sort of “I am really frustrated by Matt Dillon’s character being treated horribly, but still intrigued by where this is all going” kind of way. Wayward Pines comes off as a sort of cross between The Prisoner and Twin Peaks, and that is a combination I can pretty easily get behind.
It does not hurt that this show has arranged for some grade A talent. Matt Dillon stars in the lead role, and he is joined by Terrence Howard, Melissa Leo, Carla Gugino, and Toby Jones, among others. It is a great line up and while Shyamalan’s name may still elicit boos from some, the man is a good visual director and given the right material, does know how to craft a scene quite well. We get plenty of that here, as this is a mystery series that really knows how to amp up the strange and the tension. The best thing I can say is that I will gladly watch a second episode.
As far as the Q&A portion of the panel goes, producer Donald De Line and stars Reed Diamond and Tim Griffin were on hand to discuss the series and their involvement. The key thing they seemed to want to stress was how Wayward Pines would be delivering answers. While they jokingly tried not to specifically refer to Lost, they wanted to be clear that the show would not take long to get to big reveals as far as what is going on. The show currently only has 10 episodes and is designed to wrap up to an extent, were it to only ever have these 10 episodes to tell a story.
It is good to here, as I am both fond of this mini-season format (I am a busy guy) and am quite happy with a show that knows how to keep things clear, planned out, structured, and worked out enough to tell a complete story to a certain degree. Between that, the cast, and the intrigue I took away from the pilot, I will be happy to check out Wayward Pines and see what else I am in store for, as the show continues to throw me down its rabbit hole.
Wayward Pines premieres on May 14, 2015.
Aaron Neuwirth
Writer/Reviewer, Film Lover, Podcaster, Gamer, Comic Reader, Disc Golfer & a Lefty. There are too many films, TV, books, etc. for me to list as favorites, but I can assure that the amount film knowledge within my noggin is ridiculous, though I am always open to learning more. You can follow me on Twitter @AaronsPS4, see what else I am up to at TheCodeIsZeek.com & check out my podcast, Out Now with Aaron and Abe, on iTunes.
Comments are currently closed.