AMC's Rubicon is Painfully Slow to Watch

The AMC advertizing blitz surrounding its new show, Rubicon, worried me. I wondered if it was akin to a person talking up how great he or she is in bed only to let the partner down with the reality of the actual performance. I want to like Rubicon. I want a new show that gives the audience the benefit of the doubt and doesn't have to over explain plot points or define terms to us as though we are stupid.

Rubicon's opening credits remind me of the scenes in A Beautiful Mind where John Nash tried vainly to concoct a conspiracy out of every day news items. A good sign since I loved the movie. However, if the show's ultimate plot follows the path of a generic conspiracy thriller, then we're doomed.

Rubicon begins with a couple of tricks to try to connect us to its protagonist, Will Travers (James Badge Dale). Dale bears a passing resemblance to the late Heath Ledger when the light hits him just right and his expression is thoughtful and with little action or dialog in Rubicon, he is thoughtful a lot. If that resemblance isn't enough to tug at our hearts however subliminally, the writers gave his character a back-story that includes a wife and child killed during the 9-11 attacks. The Rubicon pilot gives us two deaths, the suicide of a billionaire we don't know and the death of Will's father-in-law and work colleague, David Hadas (Peter Gerety). But other than the fact that Hadas is extremely superstitious and was the father of Will's deceased wife, we are left with no other information about his character and no real reason to care that he is killed, although since this is Rubicon, he may or may not really be dead. I'm open to the possibility that the show will develop his character posthumously (or let us know he's really alive) as the plot thickens, but for now, who cares?

Of course, Hadas's "death" prompts Will to take a promotion from data analyst in the intelligence organization where he works to Hadas's job so he can investigate his suspicions surrounding the timing of his death. It seems Hadas died just after Will showed him a pattern he found in four crossword puzzles from four different newspapers. Hadas mentioned it to his boss and the next thing we know he's dead.

Yes, there is a conspiracy afoot, but with too many tangential plot lines like the wife of the billionaire who shot himself and Will's mentally ill former brother-in-law, and too little development of the main characters, I'm left not really caring about the people who died and not that interested in those left alive either. When the show veered off into cliché with an investigation into a possible Russian bad guy named Yuri that about did it for me. Yuri? How unimaginative. Didn't we hear that one in Kevin Costner's film No Way Out back in the 80's?

And about that thickening plot . . . While I'm all for an intelligent drama, the pace of Rubicon is frustratingly slow and after devoting three hours of my time watching the first three episodes I'm left knowing little more than I did at the beginning of Rubicon's pilot and there aren't enough clues or teasers to peak my interest. Actually, very little happens in those three hours. Watching Will walk the streets wondering if someone is following him gets boring after a while and by the time he confronts the person toward the end of the Rubicon's third episode, I'm to numbed by boredom to care who is following him or why.

A new series needs to grab me by the end of the third episode or I stop using my precious DVR space. Perhaps I lack the patience to see Rubicon through to the end of the first season. Perhaps I've been burned by getting involved in more than one TV series (Pushing Daisies, Invasion), that was cancelled by the powers that be leaving me dangling at the end of an unresolved story line. Jonathan Freeman's photography makes Rubicon beautiful to watch and evokes memories of older thrillers - Three Days of the Condor immediately springs to mind. The AMC site message boards are already buzzing with viewer theories about what may or may not be going on and some of the posts are amazingly detailed. Rubicon definitely has a fan base of intelligent people. But I've deleted Rubicon from my DVR list and will continue to enjoy Angie Harmon's return to television in Rizzoli & Isles. Of course, if the powers that be toss that one out and keep Rubicon, I'll be screaming, "Conspiracy!"