Ordinary Joe

Jump between lives way too much, too quickly to let us get in-depth details about each one. We don't get to enjoy any of it or get shown enough to really care about any one of them. It other words we are going through everything entirely too fast and with too little detail to even care. Has the potential to be an Emmy contender and a 10 but as it is it's only a 6 at best.

I wanted to like this show. I like James Wolk. Acting is decent. Interesting concept. However...

As others have said, it jumps around way too quickly. As each "life" is made up of the same actors, it becomes hard to follow. But the biggest problem I had with the show is, other than the same characters living three different lives, there's no real purpose... no reason for the links. There's no payoff. You're literally watching the same actors playing three different parts telling three variations of three essentially unrelated stories. As such, none of the stories are told particularly well and really, the "what if" premise just becomes, "oh, okay, so that would happen instead." So what?

Left me bored and wondering why.

I have been interested for years in the concept where a series of random events and choices we make have a great influence on the direction our lives take. My first wife died recently and, even though we are no longer married, for our children I wrote a 10,000 word history of how we met and the series of random events that led up to it, plus all the random events that resulted in each child being born. The kids loved it.

This new series borrows on that, where Joe at graduation and the immediate aftermath, has the opportunity of three different choices. What the program does is show us what happens in each of the different choices. It takes a bit of effort to keep up with which life we are seeing but is done very well and color shading is used, green when he is the nurse, blue when he is the policeman, and red when he is the rock star. It makes for an interesting, and thought-provoking, TV show. My wife and I have continued to watch it.

This sort of has a "This Is Us" vibe to it and that is a good thing as far as we are concerned. Another plus is that each show is available streaming on Peacock the next day so we can watch it at our leisure if we want to use the initial broadcast time for something else. Or simply re-watch parts of an episode to gain more insight.

Update FEB 2024: Seems the COVID pandemic and its aftermath just lost this TV series with no explanation.

I don't find the switching confusing, myself. But I do think this show is getting better at transitioning as it goes on. I think the rockstar storyline is over the top and looks a little cheap which takes away from how captivating it could be. But the subtleties of the other two storylines make up for it. The use of music is touching and the actors do a really great job. The politician character feels like it's reaching but missing the mark slightly- none the less I expect the show to keep getting better.

Average show with an interesting premise and a solid cast. Natalie Martinez is absolutely gorgeous, and a great casting for her role.

But, with that premise, the writing bounces around so much that it feels like it's made by a bunch of creators suffering from ADHD who can't make up their minds where to go.

It has promise. However, the usual inept failures of NBC have given it their usual kiss of death by placing it in the Monday 8pm EST time slot, trying the impossible. To compete with Monday Night Football. The NBC fools(a pathetic network that destroys most of what they get their hands on-especially their sporting events) continually try to do this impossible task, and only continually fail. And, we all know what it means when people do the same thing over and over, continually failing, and not learning from their mistakes. This is the essence of what NBC is, unfortunately.

Interested to see where the storyline goes. Hopefully, the creators take their ADHD meds and don't ruin the show with mediocre writing.