John Wells has been one of the more accomplished television producers in the past four decades; he’s best known for bringing ER to television in 1994, but he’s also written, produced and directed series like The West Wing, China Beach, Animal Kingdom, Shameless and many others. Now he and showrunner Matt Kester have taken the ER format and transferred it to the North Shore of Oahu in their new series.
Opening Shot: We see a huge wave and a graphic that says, “Pipeline. North Shore, Oahu. Winter. Three-story waves breaking in two feet of water over a sharp volcanic reef.”
The Gist: The description of the waves and conditions on the North Shore are there to tell viewers that there’s a reason why it’s gotten a reputation as one of the most dangerous stretches of coastline on the planet. Surfers are drawn to the waves but there are a lot of risks to wiping out, not the least of which is knocking yourself unconscious on the rocky reef.
The leader of District 7, the unit of Oahu’s Ocean Rescue squad which mans the North Shore, is Harlan “Sonny” Jennings (Robbie Magasiva), and his lieutenant is Emily Wright (Arielle Kebbel); they have a close working relationship and friendship whose vibe has filtered down to the lifeguards who work under them.
Will Ready (Adam Demos), an Aussie who has aspirations to become a firefighter, had more than a working relationship with Em, which is one of the reasons he might want to move on. Laka Hanohano (Kekoa Kekumano) is the most carefree of the group, seemingly hitting on anyone in a bikini. They’re excellent at what they do, as we see when a teenager from Florida tries to ride the massive waves and gets knocked out when he falls off his board.
A certification race for new recruits yields a possible new member of District 7: Hina Alexander (Zoe Cipres), a North Shore native who comes in first, which allows her to pick her assignment. Em is especially excited to get Hina on board, but is disappointed to see Kainalu Emerson (Alex Aiono), who came in second. Kainalu’s father is Honolulu city councilman Clayton Emerson (Shawn Hatosy), who is running for mayor and not-so-subtly offers the perpetually underfunded squad the prospect of getting new training equipment. As much as Em objects, Sonny tells her in no uncertain terms that in Hawaii it’s always “who you know.”
Sonny has other issues to deal with, as he’s dealing with the aftermath of an accident where four boys drowned, including his nephew. It infiltrates his dreams, and the best way he knows how to deal with it is put his head down and work.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Baywatch meets ER meets 9-1-1.
Our Take: John Wells, who brought us ER 30(!) years ago, is an executive producer of Rescue: HI-Surf and directs the pilot. Matt Kester (Animal Kingdom) is the showrunner and writer. The pair have brought a vibe to the show that’s definitely not frivolous; the opening graphic shows exactly what’s at stake for the Ocean Rescue squad on the North Shore, and the episodes will show multiple daring rescues in between the interpersonal stories.
Wells is an expert at mixing frenetic action with interpersonal stories, both of which don’t fly into the ridiculous — the first half-dozen seasons of ER had a lot of restraint in that regard — and he manages to show just how risky these rescues can be. If someone is knocked out, rip currents can take them far away quickly, and then you have the tide that can take them to deeper waters in minutes. Swimming out to rescue people, and also manning wave runners that can transport people back to shore, is no small feat, and in the rescues we see in the first episode, Wells and Kester show how difficult that can be.
There are also nuisance cases, like the woman who insists on going to the hospital after being stung by a jellyfish because she’s allergic to bees. We imagine each episode will have one or two of these kinds of cases along with the more involved rescues. There will also be the growing pains of rookies like Hina and Kainalu, which will be part of the stories.
But where the show will shine is if Kester can build out the characters to be more than just people who are great at their jobs and look good in swimwear. He doesn’t try to deep dive into everyone’s story in the first episode, and that’s just fine given how much time the rescue footage takes. But he does just enough to make us want to see more of the crew manning District 7.
Sex and Skin: Women in bikinis and men in swim trunks.
Parting Shot: Sunny and Em run the same race the rookies did because they have to recertify every year. Will and Laka watch. After the race, Laka sees Will and Em and wonders if they’re not quite over each other yet.
Sleeper Star: The way the surf is shot in this series is amazing, so we’ll give this to the director of photography and their crew.
Most Pilot-y Line: Laka tries to get in good with a paramedic, Jenn Lamonde (Sea Shimooka), by saying that Will is “descended from convicts,” yet she still says “sure, why not?” when he proposes they get a beer one night.
Our Call: STREAM IT. While Rescue: HI-Surf isn’t the deepest drama we’ve seen, the rescue scenes combined with Wells’ knowledge of how to build characters around the action give us confidence that the series has potential.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.
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Publish date : 2024-09-23 02:59:00
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