Orphan Black
Jun. 12th, 2013 02:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cdybedahlIn spite of having an increasingly large backlog of unwatched TV series episodes, many of which I know I like (like Warehouse 13), the only one I've actually been watching is a new one: Orphan Black. I don't even remember why I started watching it. I heard it mentioned and wanted something to see that I didn't care about, I think. The concept sounded reasonably interesting, with the clones and the very-near-future SF. In any case, I got hooked.
Like nearly all shows I like, it's got a lot of interesting female characters. Only in this one almost all of them are played by the same actor, Tatiana Maslany. Who is incredible. I'd never heard of her before, but holy shit can she act. It's happened on a few other shows I've seen that some actor has played different versions of the same character. Alyson Hannigan did it on Buffy, with vampire!Willow. Anna Torv and Jasika Nicole both did it quite impressively on Fringe. But Maslany here simply blows away anything else I've seen. She plays a whole bunch of characters, and they are all so different. Yes, part of it is dress and hair and makeup. But there's also postures and mannerisms and accents and movement patterns and facial expressions and... If I didn't know they were all the same woman, I'd be certain that Allison is taller than Sarah. She looks taller! There has been many scenes where two of them were in shot at the same time, and you'd never guess that they can't have both been there playing against each other.
Also, after half the season I can't even guess where the plot is going, but I really want to know. It's obvious that a lot is going on that Sarah doesn't know yet, but I'm sure that she'll find out. Or that it will find her out...
Oh, and there's obvious crossover potential with Lost Girl! It simply can't be a coincidence that Bo's mother is posing as a detective in the same department Beth was in.
Like nearly all shows I like, it's got a lot of interesting female characters. Only in this one almost all of them are played by the same actor, Tatiana Maslany. Who is incredible. I'd never heard of her before, but holy shit can she act. It's happened on a few other shows I've seen that some actor has played different versions of the same character. Alyson Hannigan did it on Buffy, with vampire!Willow. Anna Torv and Jasika Nicole both did it quite impressively on Fringe. But Maslany here simply blows away anything else I've seen. She plays a whole bunch of characters, and they are all so different. Yes, part of it is dress and hair and makeup. But there's also postures and mannerisms and accents and movement patterns and facial expressions and... If I didn't know they were all the same woman, I'd be certain that Allison is taller than Sarah. She looks taller! There has been many scenes where two of them were in shot at the same time, and you'd never guess that they can't have both been there playing against each other.
Also, after half the season I can't even guess where the plot is going, but I really want to know. It's obvious that a lot is going on that Sarah doesn't know yet, but I'm sure that she'll find out. Or that it will find her out...
Oh, and there's obvious crossover potential with Lost Girl! It simply can't be a coincidence that Bo's mother is posing as a detective in the same department Beth was in.
