{"id":78566,"date":"2015-08-17T01:00:00","date_gmt":"2015-08-17T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/?p=78566"},"modified":"2015-08-12T14:59:27","modified_gmt":"2015-08-12T13:59:27","slug":"wayward-pines-blu-ray-review-shyamalan-gets-spooky","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/reviews\/wayward-pines-blu-ray-review-shyamalan-gets-spooky\/","title":{"rendered":"Wayward Pines DVD review: Shyamalan gets spooky"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>The words \u2018M<\/b> Night Shyamalan\u2019 don\u2019t exactly inspire confidence, especially for anyone who has had the misfortune of sitting through <em><strong>After Earth<\/strong><\/em>. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">However, alongside writer and co-producer Chad Hodge, the mystical career regenerative powers of serialised television have been put to mostly good use via <em><strong>Wayward Pines<\/strong><\/em>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">Seeing Secret Service agent Ethan Burke (Matt Dillon) waking up in the titular town, the opening episodes are suitably atmospheric and mysterious, even if the vibe is inexorably one of <em><strong>Twin Peaks<\/strong><\/em> as seen through a funhouse mirror. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">You have ice cream-chomping sheriff Arnold Pope (Terrence Howard), the Nurst Ratchet-esque Pamela Pilcher (Melissa Leo) and the outwardly grandfatherly yet obviously shady Dr Jenkins (Toby Jones). It\u2019s engaging, but hardly revolutionary.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">Then a few episodes in, everything we think we know gets thrown in the air without warning, and an entirely different show emerges. Shyamalan has built his career on pulling the proverbial chair from underneath his viewers, but this is the closest something with his name on it has come to matching the \u2018he was dead all along\u2019 epiphany of <em><strong>The Sixth Sense<\/strong><\/em>. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">This plot device hasn\u2019t always worked in his films, but here it turns <em><strong>Wayward Pines<\/strong><\/em> into a different \u2013 and most importantly, better \u2013 show.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">It does help that he has a lot of talent on his side. Jones and Leo show their class once more by stealing every scene they\u2019re in, and the likes of Carla Gugino and Juliette Lewis all have pivotal moments. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">One of the biggest revelations of all is Dillon, however. Initially a fish out of water, his character changes with the show, resulting in one of his best performances to date.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\"><em><strong>Wayward Pines<\/strong><\/em> does occasionally venture into hammy territory, and not every plot hole will have been explained to everyone\u2019s satisfaction \u2013 a consequence of the show\u2019s mid-season identity crisis while it attempts to determine exactly what it is. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">What is left is a spooky and compulsively watchable pot boiler.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Matt Dillon and Toby Jones star in M Night Shyamalan&#8217;s Wayward Pines<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":78568,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"quote","meta":{"MSN_Categories":"Uncategorized","MSN_Publish_Option":false,"MSN_Is_Local_News":false,"MSN_Is_AIAC_Included":"Empty","MSN_Location":"[]","MSN_Add_Feature_Img_On_Top_Of_Post":false,"MSN_Has_Custom_Author":false,"MSN_Custom_Author":"","MSN_Has_Custom_Canonical_Url":false,"MSN_Custom_Canonical_Url":""},"categories":[2617,8],"tags":[3311],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Wayward-Pines.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78566"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78566"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78566\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78566"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78566"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}