Orphan Black

All right, well, I've taken a look at a couple of new sci-fi TV shows in the past couple months, and there's been a lot of potential, without a whole lot of great execution.

But then I watched Orphan Black, and I felt compelled to watch the entire first season in a day.

While the promos and such for Orphan Black - a BBC America original production set in Toronto - basically spoil what would otherwise be regarded as a twist at the end of episode two, the plot and particularly the characters are so well constructed that the spoilers aren't really what matter.

So, to discuss the show any further, I'm going to head into spoiler territory. I'll try to stick only to the early stuff.




The main character is Sara, an English-born woman whose life is an utter disaster. She desperately wants to make a life for herself and her daughter, who is currently living with Sara's foster-guardian, Siobhan (also referred to as "Ms. S.") Sara has one major ally in the form of her gay foster brother Felix.

Coming back into town after doing some shady stuff for her dirtbag boyfriend Vick, Sara sees a most horrifying sight: a crying woman jumps in front of a train. But the fact that this woman killed herself is not the most off-putting thing: it's that this woman looks identical to Sara.

Sara steals the woman's purse and assumes the identity of Beth Childs. But in doing so, she discovers that Beth is not Sara's only doppelgänger. After briefly meeting a German woman named Katja, who is almost immediately killed right in front of her, Sara comes to discover that she is, in fact, one of several clones. And someone is trying to kill them all off.

This central conceit would be terribly difficult to pull off were it not for the skills of lead Tatiana Maslany, who manages to build each of these characters from the ground up, with their own physicalities, mannerisms, and voices. Maslany actually plays three different series regulars, as well as a few recurring parts, and you would be forgiven for believing that the parts were played by different actors. Going even farther, when one of these women impersonates another, Maslany does not simply carry over her performance - the characters are not as good at acting as she is.

Orphan Black is so strong in its characters (mostly Maslany's, but her brother Felix is also a joy to watch) that genre fans will probably be willing to forgive the hesitance with which the show brushes against the science fiction elements. Obviously, this show is science fiction - it's about human clones, after all - but so far at least, the show is most effective as a character drama and a thriller.

In fact, when the show does delve deeper into its science fiction matters, some of the seams begin to show. In the latter half of the season, as we begin to get to know the kind of people who are behind Sara and her sisters' creation, they appear sadly a little cheesy. (Why, for instance, would a scientific movement own a dance club?)

For whatever flaws it has, though, the show remains a joy to watch. And while I do think they've got to be careful how they plan out and execute the show's mythology, there is enough human drama to sustain it.

And as just a little final note, I do appreciate the approach it takes to cloning. Yes, cloning requires technological advances that we still need to perfect, but these aren't "grown in a vat" clones. These are real people who were born from real mothers, and they've lived real lives. They are, essentially, just identical twins of one another. Cloning is one of those science fiction topics that I usually think gets boring if you think about it too hard. Thus I think it was a wise move on the part of the show's writers to focus less on the science fiction, and more on the different lives that these women have lived.