AWAKE

It is difficult to find an original program these days, especially in the drama category so when I saw a trailer for a new show called Awake I was intrigued.

The show is about a cop (Jason Isaacs), who is in an accident when his car was run off the road by another car. He wakes up after the accident and he is in a world where his wife survived and his son died. The he goes to sleep and wakes up in a world where his wife is dead and his son survived. This is an interesting concept as the character is unsure which reality, if either, is real and which he is imagining. He is under a psychiatrist in both “realities” and the shrink in both worlds is telling him that the world he is currently in is the proper reality.

As the story unfolds it turns out that he and his family were in a car crash. This led to the situation he is in. He works on cases in both dream worlds and the cases often overlap, leading the character, Detective Britten to conclude that the link between the two worlds is because there is something that his unconscious memory is trying to tell him. Indeed it transpires that the car accident that he was in was no accident, and that he was in fact run off the road in an attempt to kill him because he was working on a case that had uncovered a drugs gang with links to the police.

As the series progresses detective Britten not only works on routine cases but puts together the pieces following the accident and begins to remember the drugs case. He then has to convince his partner(s) in each reality that he needs their help to uncover the truth.To indicate which reality he is in, in one reality he has a red band on his wrist, in the other he wears a blue band. He checks his wrist when he wakes so that he can orient himself. Without giving too much away, Britten manages to put the pieces together and when he does he wakes up. The viewer wonders throughout the story which life is the real one, did his wife die or did his son die: in fact I pondered upon whether he was in a coma and his family lived, with the dreams being his way back to life.

The show does have the feel of “Life on Mars” but is by no means a copy. The series runs for thirteen episodes and it kept me interested throughout, although the ending wasn’t very satisfactory for me: But that could just be me as I wasn’t happy with the end of Life on Mars either, or Lost, or Paradox (which ended after six episodes and never returned), V (also disappeared without an end). All in all this is a good show worth watching. The cast is strong and portray their characters well. Laura Allen (the 4400, Dirt) plays Brittens wife and BD Wong (Law and order, SVU, Oz and various major shows as one off character) plays a psychiatrist. The other psychiatrist is played by Cherry Jones (24, Signs, the Perfect Storm, Oceans 12).   

If I was marking this show out of ten I’d give it an 8. It is definitely worth a watch.