Eli Stone: Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go

Eli Stone has only aired four episodes, but already it's become tired and repetitive. The potential the series once had seems lost as "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go" gave me the same old thing: quirky visions, bland trials and false emotions. A neat concept can only take you so far. To make it work you need great writing, great stories and great performances. Eli Stone is barely keeping things mediocre.

Take this main story. Eli was guided to the aid of a former comatose patient who woke up after five years to learn his wife had left him and married his former business partner. At first, it seemed the man simply wanted his stake in the company back. Eli realized the best way to reverse what happened would be to have the annulment of his marriage deemed illegal since the man was unable to participate in the process. Or something hokey like that. (Actual "law" seems to be the last thing Eli Stone is concerned about.) This led to multiple "suing God" references that no living human being would ever actually make. The show was shooting for quick, humorous banter in situations like that, but they fell miserably short. Just because you're saying the line fast doesn't make it witty.

As the case continued, Eli realized it wasn't the company but his wife that the man truly longed for. Not that there was any real emotion expressed to convey this. As is common for the show, there was little depth to the story. Characters said a lot, but you hardly ever got the feeling they truly meant it. The wife and her new husband talked about caring for Coma Guy, but they still went ahead with trying to buy him off. And then when Coma Guy did drop his lawsuit, the wife stated, "That's the man I fell in love with." What, the guy who gave up trying to be with you? Nothing in the story made sense.

Same thing went for the secondary court case involving black-on-black racism. The entire case was ridiculous. A big law firm didn't hire a young, obnoxious lawyer, so the lawyer sued claiming the firm founder didn't like "his kind" of black people. This might have worked if the young lawyer wasn't such a complete jerk. Rude, obnoxious and a brat. So it was even more unfathomable when, after said young lawyer lost his own case, that Jordan would turn around and offer to hire him. How am I supposed to care about these characters if I can't believe in these choices they're making?

Besides my annoyance with the actions of the two main court cases, "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go" was littered with reasons to be bored with this program. The connections between visions and reality were far too convenient: man needs help in vision, man shows up in real life. And how many unoriginal times are we going to watch Eli become lost in a vision only to find himself in an embarrassing situation when it ends? This week Eli was caught singing and dancing in front of coworkers. You know, like he did in the pilot and the episode after that.

The show, and this episode especially, just doesn't know what it wants to be. Is it a courtroom drama? Is it a romantic comedy? A fantasy show? A religious show? It's trying to be all those things, and it's not succeeding with any of them.