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BEING ERICA |
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Erica Strange - Erin Karpluk Dr Tom - Michael Riley Julianne - Reagan Pasternak Adam - Adam Fergus 
OFFICIAL SITE
Season 1 Season 2 Season 4 E4.com OTHER TIME TRAVEL SHOWS Doctor Who Journeyman Timecop Daybreak OTHER SELF HELP SHOWS Eli Stone 
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The Rabbit HoleErica walks through the door that leads to the rest of her life and finds herself in a group therapy session with Dr Tom's other patients. Whilst she is coming to terms with the fear that her new venture with Julianne is causing her, she is sent back in time to help one of the others, Adam, face his dying mother. The group therapy idea for the new season of BEING ERICA is a fine idea that opens all sorts of possibilities, so it's a bit disappointing that the first trip taken is a hoary old dying relative tale that really could have come from any number of shows both genre and not. The lessons to be learned are obvious and trite and not a little dull. It's a pleasure to be back in company of Erin Karpluk as Erica even though she isn't given that much to do that she hasn't done before and Michael Riley is a little bit sidelined by the addition of Adam. It is clear from the off that he is intended as some sort of love interest making the therapy complicated and that's a bit of an obvious move. There is a story in the futur for Dr Tom, though, presaged in the last few moments of the episode and it's that we can really look forward to. Then again, with the really delightful Erin Karpluk as our skating partner, we'll chase her round the figure eights until the secrets are revealed. Top Moving On UpErica is devastated by her break up with Ethan and is determined to move on, but is it too soon? Dr Tom sends her back to a hen party for Ethan's wife to find out. The addition of the group therapy members in Dr Tom's office is an interesting move, but if they are going to add as little to the show as they do here then it's also a pointless one. The side story of Erica's sister going for a job and making a connection with a janitor (her personal doctor?) threatens to dilute the focus as well. It's BEING ERICA not Being Erica, her friends and her family. Top Two WrongsBrent, from Erica's last job, steals away the book that she and Juliette had been planning to publish out of spite. Juliette, though, has an incriminating video that could end Brent's career. Dr Tom sends Erica back to Leo's time at university to see the dangers of taking revenge. Adam comes along for the ride. Violence is bad and doing something to someone just because they would do it to you makes you just as bad as they are and you end up losing in the end. It's an obvious moral and it's hammered over the audience's head until they surrender, failing even to make the most of the toga party that Erica and Adam have to attend as part of the session. Only the brief glimpse into Adam's past has anyting interesting to say at all. Top Wash, Rinse, REPEATKai has come back from the future and tells Erica that in nine years time following a big disaster in the city he was unable to find her. Distraught at the thought that she might soon be dead, Erica loses control of her day, so Dr Tom sends her back to live it over again, and again and again until she gets it right. Yes, Erica Strange gets her very own GROUNDHOG DAY episode as she tries to cope with the possibility of her own mortality. Each change makes very little difference and it is only when she learns the moral of the story, which is that it's not how long your life is, but what you do with it. It's not exactly a hard moral to figure out, but the script goes so far as to make the two leads spell it out for the hard of thinking. For once it is the emotional impact of time travel that is the problem rather than some made up issue, which makes for a nice change of pace, but the truth is that it's an old idea given the Erica twist. It's fine, but nothing new. Top Being AdamAdam gets a chance to see what his life would be like if he had never become a gangster, but what is the point of showing him that when his life is such a mess? The show is certainly in love with new boy Adam, pretty much relegating both Erica and Doctor Tom in order to give him an entire episode all to himself. Since we've gone down this route with Erica already, it's a bit redundant, although the story that it tells is certainly palatable enough. It's certainly better than the sermonising over Erica's mother's cancer not making her into an instantly breakable china doll. Top Bear BreastsErica fancies Adam, but doesn't want to do anything about it since they are both in the same group. Dr Tom suggests that she takes advantage of the Pride parade to follow all her instincts for the day and not hold back. This is an amalgamation of the episode where Erica lived a day without consequences and the day that she repeated over and over until she got it right. In this case, it's more of the same and is BEING ERICA at its most soapy. Add to that the fact that the substories about Erica's sister lying about her janitor friend's job and her parents getting back together have all be overdone so many times before and it seems like BEING ERICA is starting to be Being Without New Ideas. Top Jenny From The BlockJenny returns from LA with her life in ruins, just as Erica warned her it would be. Erica immediately helps her out by giving her a job as assistant in the publishing firm, but it is a job that she is most definitely not cut out for. The glossy soap opera that is BEING ERICA comes back to the fore with the fantasy elements relegated to almost not existing at all. The show no longer seems to know what to do with Dr Tom and Michael Riley is reduced to being just a bit part player, popping up at the end to explain the moral of the story for the benefit of those who can't think for themselves. It's not hard. Friendship is a two way street and a friendship that has one friend doing all the taking isn't a friendship at all. Considering the time that it took to summarise underlines the length that the show took to hammer it home. Top Physician Heal ThyselfKai returns to Erica's life, something that his future self told Erica would lead to her sleeping with him. This causes her some angst, enough to blind her to the fact that Dr Tom is suffering much greater problems as his wayward daughter returns as a heroin using mess. Michael Riley finally gets to take part in the show in a meaningful way, something that hasn't really happened much this season. Shifting away from needy Erica to the self-contained therapist is refreshing and gives us a chance to see just what the actor can do, a challenge that he rises to with honours. The sidelining of his character has been a major failing of the show this season and it is displayed all the more here by showing us what we have been missing. By comparison, Erica's story and, even more so, her sister's story are dull soap opera rehashes. Top Gettin' Jiggy Wit' ItOn a trip into someone else's past, Erica encounters the author of the book that her company is planning to use to launch itself and learns that his whole story is a lie. When she begs him to help, Dr Tom changes her life without her permission, breaking one of the greatest rules. This episode is all about the consequences of the time travelling that takes place in the show and the information that Erica comes into whilst in the past and as a result is a nice change of pace from the angst and romantic entanglements. The central dilemma is serious enough to warrant the reaction to it and the character of Dr Tom continues to evolve in a nicely satisfying way, though you have to wonder why he hasn't been suspended so far. The gay cafe owners' love spat and Erica's sister's travails remain irritations, but not enough to spoil one of the most intriguing episodes of this third season so far. Top The Tribe Has SpokenWith her publishing company on the edge of bankruptcy, Erica is offered a prize job at another firm. At the same time, Adam is faced with a possible relationship that could lead to everything that he ever wanted and was once shown that he could have. To help them out, Dr Tom strands them on a desert island. The change of pace with Dr Tom sending nobody to the past and merely setting up a situation for Erica and Adam to work through their decisions freshens up the show and is handled lightly enough to be a lot of fun. Admittedly, it could do without the increasingly tedious subplot about Erica's sister's relationship and the happy resolution is a little too sweet, but it at least sets up a continuation for Erica's story and some tension for Adam's. Top Adam's FamilyLife is turning around once again for Erica. Her mother's cancer has been successfully treated and her business is on the way back, but Adam has decided to stay with the woman that a vision of a different life told him would be his wife. When he finds it hard to deal with the prospect of a full relationship, Dr Tom sends him back to his early life. Our parents screw us up, but we are not our parents. That's the message and it's obvious from the very moment that Adam is transported back into a row between his mother and father. It's cereal box psychology that is only saved by the powerful performance from Adam Fergus when his character breaks down under Dr Tom's pressure. Everything else has the spectre of soap opera hanging over it. A glossy, well-produced soap opera to be sure, but a soap opera all the same. This is disappointing after last week's episode and the dilemma of a man who has seen an alternate reality and is now caught in the trap of whether he should make it happen is barely addressed. Top Erica, InterruptedErica's life is where she would like it to be, so when she wakes up from a two week coma to find that it was all just a fantasy dreamed up by her broken mind, she starts to panic. Ah, the old 'it was only a dream from your unbalanced mind' episode. It's one of the most familiar storylines regularly used in genre television, but the sudden nature of the change and the lack of any explanation for it at least gives it a mysterious edge that works well. The explanation, when it does come is worth the wait and promises to take the show off in another direction. The concentration on Erica means that there isn't a lot of time for any of the other characters, but it is also nice to see the return of some that we haven't seen in a while. Top Fa La, EricaErica is determined to show Adam the perfect Christmas, but when her plan backfires Dr Tom sends her back to previous Christmases to learn a seasonal message. Christmas is a time for overly sweet confections and there is certainly a huge amount of sugar that has been poured into this seasonal episode of the time travel self help show, but there is just enough substance to keep it on the right side of vomit inducing, though it is a close run thing at times. Michael Riley as a Dickensian carol singer is a quietly triumphant moment and displays once again that we have seen too little of him in this season, the show having suffered since it stopped being a two hander. Erin Karpluk as Erica in the body of a young Julianne is also very funny, combining the best of the two characters. If there was any way for the message of the show to be rammed home any harder, though, it would involve industrial grade hydraulics, but hey it's Christmas and that is truly a time for forgiveness. Top |
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