“Tough times, what with the economy.” – Patrick “Lights” Leary
In the opening scene of Lights Out, we see Holt McCallany, who plays the show’s main character Patrick “Lights” Leary, laid out on a gurney with his face beaten to bloody pulp. He doesn’t move, he doesn’t talk, he just lays there. This is the best piece of acting Mr. McCallany does all episode. That said, I’m going to try to be a little more generous to Holt (and to the show as a whole) than I was in my overview of the first five episodes. Now that I have seen the pilot at least three times and my expectations have been adjusted accordingly, I can appreciate the episode for what it is; a pretty solid but by no means excellent debut.
In the pilot we meet Lights, a former heavyweight champion who walked away from the ring five years earlier after losing a controversial title fight, as well as a handful of his family members. There is Theresa (Catherine McCormack), Lights’ wife, who is the catalyst for his retirement from boxing. After his big loss to the current champ, Death Row Reynolds (Billy Brown), Theresa gives Patrick an ultimatum: “Either you stop, or we stop.” I find Theresa to be pretty annoying, mainly because McCormack is a British actress doing a bad American accent. I don’t understand why shows do this. Just let her do her regular voice, it’s not like it is out of the realm of possibility for a famous boxer to hook up with an English woman.
Lights and Theresa have three daughters, two teens and one in elementary school. The two older girls are the typical TV sisters, meaning polar opposites. One asks for money for a biography on Eleanor Roosevelt, the other needs cash for a bikini wax. Stacy Keach plays Pops, Lights’ father and former cornerman. I was really excited when I heard that Pablo Schreiber was going to play Lights’ brother and manager Johnny, I liked him a lot as Nick Sobotka on The Wire. But after seeing his lack-luster performance in Lights Out, I’m starting to think that he benefited greatly from his proximity to Chris Baur, who did an amazing job as Frank Sobotka. Sort of like how middle of the road players turned into stars when the played with Michael Jordan. I guess what I’m saying is Pablo Schreiber is B.J. Armstrong.
The structure and pacing of the pilot are superb. The episode makes great use of flashbacks to punctuate the present day action. I just wish the dialog and performances were on the same level.
Initially, everything seems peachy for Lights. His wife is in her final year of medical school, Pops is running his own boxing gym, his daughters are happy and healthy. But things aren’t what they seem. A risky real estate venture and the economic collapse have left Lights nearly broke. Johnny hasn’t exactly done a bang up job managing Patrick’s finances for the past five years. Tuition and mortgage payments are piling up and the IRS is sniffing around. Patrick is stuck taking humiliating gigs announcing bingo games to try to make ends meet. To make matters worse, he is having trouble remembering things like his social security number.
Money is so tight that Lights takes a job from an ex-bookie named Brennan with a connection to Johnny. Some dentist owes Brennan half a million dollars and for some reason (a bunch of nonsense about the dentist being a sports buff) Brennan wants to use Lights as muscle to retrieve it. “The bigger they are…huh?” Roger remarks when he realizes the reason why a former boxing champ is in his house. That’s a really good line. Unfortunately it’s followed up with a really on-the-nose line from Lights, “Tough times, what with the economy.”<br /> <br /> The signature scene of the pilot occurs late in the episode and features three flashbacks spliced together. Lights is having a talk with his youngest daughter in an ice cream parlor about his last fight (which she has just seen clips of on TV). He assures her that he will never fight again. Cut to a scene at a local bar and Lights is beating the daylights out of a former Giants lineman. Cut back to a scene at Roger the dentist’s house and Lights is breaking Rog’s arm. Sure, Lights, you’ll never fight again. I believe you.
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.