Season 1, Episode 1
Date of airing: September 28, 1996 (CBS)
Nielsen ratings information: 16.0 million viewers, 11.0/20 in Households
Teleplay by: Bob Brush, Ian Abrams
Story by: Patrick Q. Page, Vik Rubenfeld, Ian Abrams
Directed by: Michael Dinner
Once it was my mission to know everything about 1990s television, considering I am a kid of that decade. I watched a lot of television back then, as well as throughout the early to mid-2000s because I was a lazy high school student with no friends and hobbies to speak of, which means TV shows became my hobby and I had a lot of time to follow that hobby. EARLY EDITION happened to be one of the shows uniquely and perfectly situated in my days, as most of the shows aired after I came home from school, ready to drop my butt on the couch, turn on the television and watch my way through dinner and to bedtime, without doing any homework or otherwise preparing for the following school day. EARLY EDITION was a show I followed before I even knew that I was a television junkie, but the show was never a big success on German TV - it changed networks twice, the timeslots were random (first in primetime where it was canceled before a whole season aired, then weekday afternoons which is where I found the show, then on weekend mornings only – talking about not being able to find a show that way), and publishing the show beyond the means of television (DVDs, streaming) never seemed to be in the cards or important for the studio. But hey, EARLY EDITION is also one of the first shows I ever imported the DVDs from another country, so there is that. In a way, EARLY EDITION is a show that primed me for more television viewing as I became mature and therefore will always have a special place in my heart.
Now it is time to watch the entire show, which is something I have never done, thanks to the fact that German TV aired it irregularly. The complete series has been released on DVD for a while now and I am almost sure EARLY EDITION is being syndicated at least somewhere, ready for a new audience to discover Gary Hobson's heroic attempts at making days better for random people (the gender-swapped reboot with Alice Eve, if having been given a green light by CBS, could have given this 90s TV drama new life). It is one of the shows you could just drop in to watch, as it never had an overall arc going from one episode to the next. Recurring characters it certainly had, but if you are expecting to get a major story out of a show about a guy receiving tomorrow's newspaper today, maybe you should look somewhere else.
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| The rumors are true: You are having a look into the future. |
For a show from 1996, the pilot episode stands the test of time quite well. Yes, it certainly has the uplifting 1990s morale of the week theme, and being a family-friendly show, there is not one ounce of violence or a drop of blood (the most gruesome thing of this episode might be Gary looking into the barrel of a pistol), but with all the dark and gritty and violence cable and premium channel dramas, EARLY EDITION is almost like a fresh breeze – a show that calms you down after you witnessed the murder of a third of the main cast in GAME OF THRONES. A show which smiles at you when you witness that Gary didn't just win all the race track money for himself, but went there with a good-hearted purpose (which he may not even have known about in the beginning) and made a happy woman out of Marissa, who needed a break herself and got it in the form of Gary Hobson. It's a show that gives you what you might have been looking for after the series finale of LOST, as the writers said "No way" to the obvious mysteries of the origins of the Chicago Sun-Times from tomorrow and didn't even bother to make it an important question in this episode. Yes, Gary, Marissa, and Chuck were wondering out loud where the paper comes from, but was Gary ever interested in the answer? Most likely not. He wasn't even interested in getting the paper in the first place. Although he probably would have accepted an answer to his question if it meant he wouldn't be getting the paper any longer.
EARLY EDITION is a simple show, and it comes with a simple premise for its pilot and less than a handful of main characters to follow. The newspaper from tomorrow is in today's hands – what would you do with it? Gary speaks to the viewers through voiceovers at the opening and closing of the episode and it's a thought one might chase through their head because knowing the future a day in advance is one of the easiest fantasies to come by, to think about, and to discuss its meaning or what you would do. Making a quick buck seems quite obvious, and it's not like Gary has never thought about it when given the chance, but what the episode did surprisingly well was to ask its audience whether they would try to become a better person. Whether they would have a change of heart about the paper after seeing someone you consider a friend (or someone you love) get hurt and you could have prevented that from happening. Would you become a hero under these circumstances? Would you listen to the voice of morale that is Marissa (the good devil on Gary's shoulder) and overcome the voice of temptation that is Chuck (the evil devil on Gary's other shoulder)?
By the way, how is it even possible for Gary to consider someone like Chuck as a friend? Granted, there is a possibility that Chuck turned into an annoying person when he realized he had access to a ton of cash via the paper of tomorrow, which turns him into an egotistical maniac, but that behavior doesn't just come out of nowhere, especially when it concerns stockbrokers. Chuck is supposed to be the comic relief of the show, but it turns out he is the comical annoyance you wouldn't mind slapping senseless every once in a while, and maybe even think about forgetting his home number after he dared to steal a page from the paper. Without a doubt, Chuck is the worst part of the show after only one episode, which shocks even me to say it, considering the character seemed to have been popular with the 90s audience and possibly one reason why the series was losing life and viewers during the third season, after Fisher Stevens exited the show. We might have met Chuck late in his life, and as a stockbroker, he could be a good dude, but damn, dangle money in front of his eyes and he becomes a rich Wall Street dick. I had some serious urges not to assemble a futuristic device that plants me directly into the show, so I can hit Chuck over the head with the suitcase he put his cash in.
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| This being a family-friendly show, the revolver is not loaded, despite what the headline says. |
One final notion about this episode and especially Frank: The headline said that his bank robbery cost the lives of nine people, later ten after Marissa decided to get involved. But Frank only had a revolver that has room for six bullets. That means Frank must have taken the time to reload his revolver and continue killing innocent people. That makes his bank hold-up more than premeditated, making me worry about what kind of character he really was and if the writers even thought about that notion. A guy who comes into a bank ready to kill more people than he has room for bullets in his gun does not just want to be heard. This is something to think about for Gary, next time he is saving people from getting shot by a person who may or may not just be desperate.
