Eric Roberts doesn't surprise anyone in FEAR ITSELF: Spooked(2008).
© NBC-Universal

Mania Grade: C
TV Series: Fear Itself
Episode: Spooked
Starring: Eric Roberts, Cynthia Watros, Larry Gilliard Jr.
Written By: Matt Venne
Directed By: Brad Anderson
Network: NBC

Related Links

0

FEAR ITSELF: Spooked

This week’s episode of Fear Itself is brought to you by Brad Anderson, the writer of such film classics as Session 9 and Frankenstein’s Planet of Monsters. He directed the Masters of Horror episode Sounds Like. If you saw that episode, then you know what to expect here as far as quality. It’s not bad, but it’s not that great either. The episode was written by Matt Venne, the man responsible for the screenplay for White Noise 2: The Light and the Masters of Horror episode Pelts. The meeting of these minds doesn’t exactly drop the bucket into the well of enthusiasm for the episode but I will say it’s not terrible – which is somewhat of a relief after “sacrificing” time for the first episode.

Eric Roberts plays a bitter cop who literally gets away with murder. He commits a string of violent acts upon criminals in order to extract information from them. His most recent adventure involves mortally wounding a criminal in order to get him to reveal the location of a kidnapped child. When the criminal dies as a result of the wounds inflicted upon him, Roberts is fired from his job. The screenplay ham fistedly covers any further punishment to Roberts by explaining that the kidnapped child was the son of a government official. The question is why wasn’t Roberts’ character fired and even thrown in jail for all of his previous antics that include and aren’t limited to burning a woman on her legs with a cigar? On his deathbed, the criminal delivers a message to Roberts that will of course reoccur later in the episode.

Years later, Roberts is working as a gumshoe taking recordings and pictures of cheating spouses and even black mailing some of his clients when he discovers they are just as dirty as the person they are paying him to investigate. A new investigation puts Roberts in an abandoned house spying on the house across the way. This abandoned house is haunted and the ghosts force Roberts to face his demons.

Much of this episode is predictable and sort of “been there, done that” but it has a few moments of note. The way Roberts is coaxed into the haunted house is unique and like last week the practical effects are pretty good. The flashbacks look a bit too much like glamour shots though. The episode wants to be a film noir; it also wants to have a surprising twist. In the end, the twist isn’t surprising and the noir detective aspects work but aren’t that noir. It’s like poor television “wannabe noir” a best. Roberts is fine in the role though – he does the best he can. He’s no A lister and usually seeing his name in the opening credits is an event for worry, but he seems to be finding his place on genre TV series such as this one and Heroes. He’s sort of like Bruce Boxleitner in Babylon 5. He’s not an actor to be followed but his run on Babylon 5 was quite good. This series is crawling toward being great like a turtle going up hill. This episode was a bit better than the first and the early word is that the third episode – airing next week – is even a little better than this one: let’s hope.