Shooter - Advance Preview: “Nonsensical mediocrity”

With so much programming right now - not even necessarily high-quality (though there is a lot of that), but a lot of shows that all deserve a fair chance at making an impression - sampling the latest in a long, long, long line of new shows to premiere can eventually boil down to watching the pilot and making a decision based on that one episode. Such is the way that TV works now. There’s only so much time in the day for watching, and so much to watch. As a result, opinions on any given show are going to be shaped by what is, essentially, a really long trailer (a concept that is only slightly less bad than people who watch a trailer and decide they have no interest in even trying the show based on it). I do it all the time, and I imagine that, with the broadcast networks having premiered a slew of new shows when the 2016-17 season began just over a month ago, a lot of people also did it in substantial portions.

Often, the show that a pilot depicts is very different to the one it becomes even a few episodes later, in both style and quality. Sometimes things change for the worse; other times, they change for the better. Shooter falls into neither category, and my view of what the show is based on the pilot alone compared to my feeling after the four episodes USA sent critics (*) is pretty much the same.

(*) USA originally sent four episodes back in the early days of summer when the series was still slated for a July release. In anticipation of the revised premiere, the network sent the remaining six hours, but I felt no desire to watch them; the initial four were enough to get an understanding of Shooter.

Premiering Tuesday, November 15 at 10pm on USA Network (the series was originally supposed to air July 19, but it was pushed a week due to the Dallas shootings on July 7; a further delay came after the July 17 Baton Rogue shootings), Shooter revolves around Bob Lee Swagger (Ryan Phillippe), a former Marine sniper who is enlisted by Homeland Security - specifically, his old CO Isaac Johnson (Omar Epps) - to help deal with a plot to kill the President. The series is based on the Mark Wahlberg 2007 film of the same name (and the Stephen Hunter novel Point of Impact) and the opening hour roughly follows the basic plot of the feature: while attempting to stop POTUS from being assassinated, Swagger ultimately fails and ends up being framed for the crime, leading to him having to clear his name.

Frustratingly, this is another of those shows where if you’ve seen the trailer, you’ve pretty much seen the pilot. It’s an occupational hazard of a show like this and, given the way that the pilot takes its time to build up Swagger’s character (as it well should), this results in a necessity for the execution (no pun intended) of the lead-up to the main event to be gripping and tense and well-constructed. Unfortunately, that’s not the case, and it ultimately ends up being a seemingly never-ending line of clichés, dumb scenes conveyed as reasonable and a tedious wait for the main event to happen. It’s painfully, painfully obvious what will happen and Shooter does very little in the way of counteracting that with smart, considered storytelling. It’s a slog to actually get to anything notable in the first hour and that journey is a bad one. Making your audience wait for an inevitable moment can be smart; in this instance, it is not.

This becomes a problem for two reasons. Firstly, the end result could be construed as a complete waste of time, thanks to how unmemorable Shooter makes the 40-minute version of the 90-second trailer, something that isn’t needed in the world of Peak TV. Secondly - and most importantly - it provides a misrepresentation of what this series is. It spends so much time trying to get to where it can finally kick things off that it runs out of time to demonstrate why people should actually watch it. Yes, there’s a lot of mystery involved, and for some viewers, that’ll be enough of a hook. But the laziness with which those mysteries are haphazardly taped together frustrated me endlessly, and my enthusiasm to continue with the show beyond the pilot was limited to: “Well, surely it has to get better now that the premise is established?”

That hopeful assumption was partially correct to a very limited degree. While the show doesn’t get much better in the following three episodes, it does show a slight turn in fortunes when it alters its focus, and it’s baffling to see how much energy it possesses in those episodes compared with its debut. That isn’t to say that my previous critique of the show’s stupidity doesn’t remain; hell, it arguably gets worse in this department with each passing episode. Indeed, characters and plot twists are convenient and idiotic to the point of sheer ridiculousness (*), yet all the while it’s difficult not to wonder exactly how anyone will get out of their respective predicaments thanks to a combination of their own mindless decisions and the way the story has locked them into having to deal with situations that are so outlandish and forced that they can only be part of a form of scripted entertainment. But at least it feels like each episode wants to get somewhere and do something of substance.

(*) As a result of the issues with the plot, Phillippe is required to carry much of the heavy lifting himself. While he’s consistently solid, he doesn’t quite reach the levels that would elevate this show far above its flawed storytelling.

What I’m saying, essentially, is that as ludicrously written the story is at times, it is somewhat of a draw in wanting to invest time into the show. Enough suspension of disbelief in virtually every scene will allow for greater enjoyment from this series. If you want any sort of realism, this isn’t for you.

Once the framing takes place, we move into much more interesting territory as Swagger attempts to clear his name, and the problems that he encounters trying to do so in an uphill battle is perhaps the true hook for the show. Cynthia Addai-Robinson plays Nadine Memphis, an FBI agent involved with the assessment of the threat against POTUS and who injects herself into the Swagger investigation. My thoughts on her ranged from “Addai-Robinson is a much better actress than to be playing the run-of-the-mill FBI agent” to “That’s all they’re going to do with her?” She’s kept active, frequently used within the depiction of the case, but so often is her role fundamentally clichéd - there’s a point in the second episode where her boss, FBI Agent John Renlow (David Marciano), literally says to her, "I'll find another female agent.” - that if this show wants anyone to take it seriously, it isn’t going about it in the right way at all. Plus, her motivations so weak and generic that I have very little investment in her as a character.

Indeed, that could be applied to all of the show’s major characters, born from that aforementioned mindlessness. Perhaps it’s only the insight that can be had watching from the outside, but I was frequently telling my screen during the pilot how dumb Swagger was for some of his actions that led up to his being framed. Johnson is, perhaps, the only character for whom I have any interest. He may not be an especially groundbreaking character, but he’s somewhat complex (the fourth episode, particularly, sheds light on this) and though it’s obvious where he’ll end up by the end of these ten episodes, his progression to that point is at least constructed in a way that makes you see his conflict. Other characters come as you see them: Jack Payne (Eddie McClintock), who works with Johnson in the POTUS threat assessment, is a pretty stock character; Swagger’s wife, Julie (Shantel VanSanten), is what you’d expect for the loving wife of a man accused of murder, and VanSanten doesn’t do anything substantial with it; and CIA agent Hugh Meachum (Tom Sizemore) is entirely one-dimensional to the point of boredom.

Not that the entirety of USA’s freshman slate for the coming years should be compared to Mr. Robot, but anyone expecting or hoping Shooter to be another drama of that calibre will be wholeheartedly disappointed. It pales in comparison (*) to the hacker drama, unable to provide the adequate social commentary or engaging, complex-in-nature thrills. What Shooter does attempt to say about the world isn’t what the opening scene of the pilot would suggest, is limited in nature, and probably makes it a more flawed show.

(*) When I began my first draft of this piece, I’d recently watched Mr. Robot’s second season premiere. Comparing it to Shooter in terms of the technical aspects reflects badly on USA’s latest series: the camera work in Mr. Robot is almost certainly the best on television with clever, meaningful framing in every single shot used; the fourth episode of Shooter features a few-seconds-long shot of a hill where the camera refuses to remain still, and it’s extremely off-putting. That’s only one infuriating example, but the technical side of things is so inherently bland that it’s sad to see.

Four episodes into Shooter and my desire to see more is pretty limited. It’s far from the worst thing to air in recent memory, but with so much choice on offer right now, is it worth your time? Not especially.

Shooter premieres on November 15th at 10pm on USA Network.