Review: The Middleman

John Walker introduces the world to The Middleman, written by a Lost veteran and mired on the low-budget ABC Family.

Javier Grillo-Marxuach originally intended The Middleman to be a TV pilot. Yes, clearly this happened, but years after he set his work in motion. The established television writer (Lost, Medium, Charmed) first had ambitions to create a show about the sort of heroism and science fiction that had decorated his childhood in 1998, when he wrote the original pilot. Deemed too peculiar by his peers, he sat on the project until the mysterious Middleman and his fresh recruit, artist Wendy Watson, were first seen “fighting evil so you don’t have to” in a four-part comic book in 2005, published by Viper Comics. Three comic volumes later, and everything has come full circle: ABC Family optioned the comic into a show.

Wendy Watson (Natalie Morales) is a struggling artist, sharing an illegal sublet with another young, photogenic artist, Lacy Thornfield (Brit Morgan). Wendy works as a temp to make ends meet, and one job in particular lands her on the phones at A.N.D. Laboratories. An experiment gone wrong leads to a giant “hentai tentacle monster” attacking her, and thus the rescuing appearance of the titular Middleman himself (Matt Keeslar). Wendy’s preternatural ambivalence to the seemingly impossible situation catches the Middleman’s attention, and he swiftly sets about recruiting her. Once convinced, the two team up, alongside the acerbic robotic assistant, Ida (Mary Pat Gleason, who sours it up beautifully looking like a Beryl Cook character), to fight against aliens, monsters, demons and hyper-intelligent gorillas determined to wipe out the mafia.

The Middleman immediately distinguishes itself by its on-screen captions. When each scene in Wendy Watson’s apartment is captioned “The illegal sublet Wendy shares with another young, photogenic artist,” you realize this isn’t an attempt at hard-hitting sci-fi. The dialogue – which might perhaps better be called banter – underlines this, with characters speaking in zippy one-liners, inevitably archly referencing comparative pop culture. The precise and hilarious scripts might immediately be called “Whedonesque,” and it’s no surprise that Grillo-Marxuach wrote most of the pilot’s dialogue two years into Buffy’s run. Had anyone managed to emulate Whedon’s sass-filled writing since, it might seem old-hat, but the rather embarrassing failure of projects that have tried to copy Buffy or Firefly’s dynamic (see last year’s execrable Flash Gordon reprise for the most heinous example of this) means The Middleman is refreshing.

However, comparisons with Buffy The Vampire Slayer do pretty much end there. Episodes may feature succubae working in the fashion industry or fish-formed zombies killing for trout, but there is not even a whiff of the woe and fear that existed in Buffy's Sunnydale. Buffy may have always beaten the monsters, but she was inevitably left wrestling with her conscience, love life or inner demons. The darkness at the heart of Whedon’s work has no place in Grillo-Marxuach’s world. The Javi-centric World View, as he calls it, is one of colorful, earnest optimism.

Wendy’s exchanges with Noser, another inhabitant of the apartment block who apparently spends his days sat in the corridor, a guitar on his lap, best exhibit the central philosophy of the program.

“Yo, Wendy Watson,” he soothingly mumbles.
“Hey Noser,” she replies.
“Who’s the man?”
“That would be Shaft, Noser,” says Wendy with a tone of comfortable familiarity.

What kind of man, he asks. “A comfortable man.” And who understands him? “No one but his woman,” comes the conversational reply. “Right on.”

It’s the idealistic, impossibly cool chatter we’d love to pretend we have with all our friends, neither exploding in giggles but instead coolly carrying on with their day. Happy-go-lucky, relaxed and self-assured people, able to glide through life, despite the alien kidnappings.

The mystery Middleman has his own distinct mannerisms that also imbue the show with its winning amiability. Despite being an ex-Navy Seal, the nameless fellow who guides Wendy through the processes of dealing with the paranormal and extra-terrestrial to protect the public, speaks like a comic character from the 1940s. I’m not sure there’s another contemporary show that could get away with using the phrase “feats of derring-do” without sounding hideously corny, let alone so appropriately. When angered by someone’s attempts to plagiarise Wendy’s paintings, he declares, “I’ll clean his clock!” This is a character who can deliver the line, “This duck’s seen things no feather-bearing water foul should ever see,” while casually putting the poor bird in a secret compartment in the wall, oblivious to its confused quack.

Where The Middleman comes undone is by its budget. The constraints are horribly clear in every episode, which is a bit of a blow for a show so heavily reliant on spaceships, mutant fish and robots. The CGI is particularly glaring, making the BBC’s efforts in Doctor Who look almost acceptable, but it also reveals itself in the limited sets and the peculiar lack of atmosphere in many scenes. It’s hard to nail down exactly what generates this, beyond a feeling of cheapness. When a UFO descends to kidnap an apparent victim of terrible plastic surgery, it’s hard to not feel vibes of Ed Wood. And not in the good way.

However, it’s remarkable how far you can be carried by charm, and The Middleman has it in buckets. Whether it’s the one-liners (“Did you skinny-dip in the stupidity pond?”) or Middleman’s turn of phrase (“Her heart’s going to explode like a sausage casing full of weasels”), the misuse of cursing (bleeped out with a big black box covering the person’s mouth) or just the chilled ambience and inevitability of a happy ending, it’s hard not to love it. But ABC, please, go on, throw a bit more cash at it.

John Walker is a freelance contributor to Giant Realm.

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