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Rating: Country: USA Release Date: September 2, 2008 Distributor: Touchstone / Disney Cast: · Jonny Lee Miller · Natasha Henstridge · Victor Garber · Julie Gonzalo · Matt Letscher · Sam Jaeger · Lorette Devine Related Sites: · IMDb: Eli Stone Grade: B-

Taking the typical episodic legal format and injecting some maudlin ruminations on faith, empathy and personal sacrifice for loved ones, along with a little Ally McBeal sassiness and some awkward Viva Laughlin (yes, THAT Viva Laughlin) musical sequences, Eli Stone passes the time inoffensively but gets a little too sudsy by season’s end to be entirely recommendable. In typical Greg Berlanti form, an interesting idea soon becomes wrapped up in cheesy one-liners, endless inter-office bed hopping and a parade of unbelievable, misunderstood saints, who mask their sincerest intentions with clichéd baggage. Viewers who expect very little from their television programming and appreciate a show that requires absolutely no thought or personal reflection, will find pleasure in this week-to-week serial, which does not need to be followed sequentially to be fully grasped. Think of it as art house cinema for the American Idol crowd.

Following a barrage of bizarre, influential visions involving George Michael, Eli Stone (Jonny Lee Miller) learns that he has an inoperable brain aneurysm that runs in the family. His father, whom Eli had always dismissed as an insane alcoholic, had the same ailment, which inevitable leads to some empathy, regret and guilt on the part of Eli. 

Fearing the impact that his condition will have on his foxy gal-pal, fellow legal eagle Taylor Wethersby (Natasha Henstridge)—who just happens to be the daughter of Eli’s big bad boss Jordan Wethersby (Victor Garber)—he cuts her loose and starts up flirtations with a younger lefty-activist co-worker Maggie Dekker (Veronica Mars’ Julie Gonzalo), while Taylor gets pelvic with resident dickhead Matt Dowd (Sam Jaeger). 

Further hanky-panky seems to be reserved for season two, when one can only hope that they will have Victor Garber get a little sleazy with Eli’s spunky black secretary, Loretta Devine. 

On the upside, the visual effects on Eli Stone are certainly above average in the realm of television fare, which, given the fact that the show is focused on Eli’s bizarre visions, helps things along quite a bit. Also, watching the affable alien from Species sing songs and tap her toes is alone almost worth the price of admission. The antipodal side to the musicality, however, is having to see Sydney Bristow’s dad (yes, we all know he nancied around back in the 70’s version of Godspell, which was likely enjoyed more so by those under the influence of herbal narcotics) make sexual singing faces while belting out pop tunes in uncomfortably high octaves. 

While the court case involving the baseball player was interesting and thankfully somewhat subversive, other cases, primarily the one involving racism—natch, are so namby-pamby politically correct that it’s nauseating. Not to mention how unlikely it is that Jordan Wethersby would decide to hire the kind of wanker who would claim discrimination simply because he was not hired for a job. That is not really a quality that employers look for in potential employees: a tendency to respond in an immature and overly emotional manner to personal criticism and rejection.

The DVD includes Bloopers and Deleted scenes in addition to an extended pilot episode with commentary. The bloopers show a cast that is entirely comfortable with liberal use of profanity, which for a relatively Christian show is pretty darn entertaining. Mini-featurettes on George Michael (every episode of season one is named after a George Michael song), visual effects and “behind the scenes” are standard issue, giving only minor insights, as is the “Natasha Henstridge tour” that is someone more interesting given that Ms. Henstridge is naturally pleasant and likable.