The Glade 4.0

The Tick, and his creator, Ben Edlund, have returned, as part of Amazon's Pilot Season. This is a reboot/revamp/rewhateveryouwanttocallit from Ben Edlund himself, and its tone is more...I want to go with "grounded?" The Tick's still The Tick, though; everyone around him just has more psychological depth.

It feels like this new version of The Tick is going to take some time to gel, but once it gets there, will be stellar. Peter Serafinowicz is aces as the new Tick (even if his suit takes a little getting used to), and the acting is strong across the board. I liked Ben Edlund's script, too; really, the only thing that dragged it down was Wally Pfister's leaden direction. Christopher Nolan's DP is maybe not the best guy to tackle comedy, as it needed a far more nimble touch than I'd assume anyone related to any of Nolan's enterprises could offer.

It was good. I'm not completely sure that a few more episodes will cure me of kind of half-wishing Patrick Warburton was stuck in the middle of this, instead, though. Serafinowicz was better than I was fearing, though -- while I'm not sure he nailed the comedic delivery the way Warburton did, his voice turned out to be a good follow-up even though he still looks like he's drowning in the suit.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

It's.... a real TV show. There's drama, not as much comedy as I was expecting, and then the tick throwing people through walls all of a sudden. A much darker take, meshed with the typical Tick insanity.

It felt kind of tonally discordant, but it was a pilot. The terror is finally terrifying, and I agree with Peter Serafinowicz's portrayal. Warburton was incredible casting, and apparently they reached out to him, but he couldn't do it this time (I was happy to see he has a producer credit).

Really hoping this one gets picked up, I'd love to see how it develops over several seasons.

P.S. Don't forget to go to http://www.amazon.com/pilotseason and fill out the survey if you want them to make this show.

Yeah, that's the best way to put it. It's like Edlund took what he's learned working as writer and producer on shows like Firefly, Angel, and Supernatural and grafted them onto the silliness of The Tick. It's jarring to see psychological depth applied to some of these characters...Arthur becomes a legitimately and realistically damaged human being, and the nihilism of that sequence with The Terror is, well, terrifying (kudos also to Jackie Earl Haley there).

It may rob it of a bit of the fun when you're forced to see the aftermath of rampant absurdism affect living, breathing (or in some cases, not anymore) people, but it feels like something that could pull you in, more so than disconnected comedic vignettes.

Agreed. I went into it expecting the slapstick silliness of the Tick (even though I knew Edlund had talked about making it a "more connected" universe to compete with the all the Marvel series netflix is dropping), but I found it REALLY shocking how broken Arthur is. It makes complete sense, he is a man who puts on a giant bunny suit; something was always not quite right. However, to deal with it in such a psychological and reality based way (dot's serious concern, his issues with medication), really took it to a different place. As well as the pilot going so deep into his various issues all the way back to If that won't mess you up, I don't know what will.

http://www.avclub.com/tvclub/tick-pilot-transforms-parody-pathos-241434

I need more of this. It was fabulous.

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Holy shitsnacks!

They reused lines from the old cartoon!

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When he's underwater does he get wet? Or does the water get him instead?