intriguing and interesting, but ruined by plot holes, inconsistencies and an unsatisfying finale

cherold

****Non-Spoiler Review**** I watched all of Persons Unknown. It was a fairly intriguing show that managed to keep coming up with new ideas for what seemed like a rather thin premise. There were some very effective moments. I was very curious to learn what it was all about but, as other people have noted, that was not to be. Because of the ending, I wish I had never heard of this series, as I feel it was basically a waste of my time. Some people on this board are talking as though there will be a second season, but this was a miniseries (and apparently a poorly-rated one at that) so this ending is it. With a better ending I would have given this a somewhat better rating even though it had numerous problems throughout (see below).

*****Spoiler Section Below***** While the ending was clearly the biggest problem with the show, there were some really big issues earlier on. The first involves the time when some of the prisoners come up with the theory that if they drag the hotel manager through the pain wall it will be turned off, because he's one of them. Other prisoners insist he's an innocent stooge and free him, whereupon he runs right through the pain wall. So the prisoners who grabbed the guy now know that they were right. The hotel manager comes back, and the prisoners DON'T RETRY IT, even though they now know it could work. They know he is one of them, but they make no further attempt to beat the truth out of him, or use him as a tool, or anything else. It is even brought up again as something that was ruined by the more soft-hearted prisoners, but it is never tried again.

Another issue is when they realize that Joe is one of them. At this point, the show does a major cheat: it is clear that Joe explains at least some of what is going on to the prisoners, but he does it off camera. Also, Joe keeps saying he believes in the program, as though it is a worthy cause. But as we learn, the program forces the prisoners to kill each other. How could otherwise decent people see this program as anything other than evil? And everything you see of the program suggests it is an evil, evil organization that shows no mercy for anyone.

Then there is the ending. First off, the ending is emotionally unsatisfying, leaving everyone in terrible situations, which is not what you want in a miniseries. There are also things that just don't make sense. At the end the survivors are placed together again. Clearly the way the process would normally work is there is one survivor, and he would go on to be with a new group of prisoners. Since all these people survived, it would make sense to put them each in a separate track, rather than have them basically continue their initial thing in a new place.

Thought about more deeply, one has to conclude that the premise of The Program makes no sense. How is finding out who in an organization is most likely to kill other people to survive going to get you exceptional people? And what are these exceptional people to be used for? Unless they're looking for killers, and it does not appear that they are, then it's a senseless way to do things.

The story was simply poorly constructed and not well thought out. It works neither on the metaphorical level of something like The Prisoner or as a mystery-suspense story.

score 6/10

cherold 16 November 2010

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw2339952/