Under the Dome: Prisão Invisível

I'm not surprised by all the negative reviews. It's one of the most frustrating series I've ever watched, the premise is fantastic, a wonderfully clever plot, but after the first few episodes it seems to lose the plot completely. Series one was pretty decent I thought, watchable, Series two was more of the same, but felt a bit lethargic, Series three was an abomination, and shouldn't have been made, it totally lost the plot.

The acting was patchy, it started well, then seemed to go off the boil as it went on. I think had it been a single series, with a definite explanation it would have worked better, the usual criticisms with shows like Lost, Walking Dead etc is they milk them until they kill them, and have no choice but to cancel, sometimes less is more, in this case it would have been.

Interesting at the start, a few good bits, but way too many missed opportunities, all I can remember thinking was if I saw that cow once more I'd switch off, however I saw it through to the terrible conclusion.

A waste.

Most of the terrible reviews here are basically for season three, which ultimately ruined the show for good, but few mention that season one was actually good, very good! If it had been just a one-season series it would've been up there with the best of them. It was witty, suspenseful, weird, dramatic, etc. Unfortunately, season 2 takes an unsolicited left turn. While still featuring some good episodes, the damage was done. When season 3 came out, it was too late, with some of the worst writing ever, featuring some painful plot twists that made no sense at all. It's as if the creators wanted to destroy their show on purpose.

Watch season one ONLY!

On the whole, there was good pacing and narrative for Seasons 1 and 2. The slow unravelling of the storyline was enjoyable. The majority of the cast were well chosen and suited to their characters.

Season 3 was a let down. There really wasn't any complexity to the season 3 storyline, so trying to fill 13 episodes would have been difficult and that becomes obvious with long scenes, and scenes about nothing - some talking, some arguing and fighting, that adds nothing to the storyline, but does fill time.

Season 3 is at least six episodes too long- the entire season 3 storyline could have been revealed in eight episodes or less instead of 13 episodes.

This is an interesting show with an interesting sci-fi / fantasy premise. Unfortunately, the episodes' writers and production team themselves suffered from a "we don't know what the heck we're writing here, we're just gonna keep you entertained in each individual episode". There is a story that moves forward from episode to episode, but several nuances and even aspects that were very huge just a few episodes prior become completely abandoned and betrayed.

** SPOILERS BELOW **

For example, in one of the middle episodes of season one, the world outside put on a big show of "goodbye" which it turns out because the military would nuke the whole village, but this strange dome ended up protecting its contents. For the next couple episodes, as I recall, the whole area just outside the dome was, well, nuked, completely barren. But by the last few episodes, the whole town just outside the dome is back again, green and lush with the same neighborhood that was there before it was all nuked, as if nothing back then had happened.

The whole "the butterfly is the monarch!" thing followed by the "you're the monarch!" and "he's the monarch!" and "she's the monarch!" played like a horribly played game of duck-duck-goose.

Some of the main characters are utterly unbelievable as human beings. "Junior", a fully grown young man who jumps from insane and imprisoning a former lover, to sane and competent and entrusted with a badge. A female top cop gullibly believes everything one guy (Big Jim) says and does the most ridiculous actions no cop would ever do, like tell everyone not to touch an alien lit-up device but then she goes and touches it herself, for no reason, at her own injury.

The show retained my attention to cause me to binge-watch, but by the end of Season One I was mostly irritated I got suckered into such a stupid mess of sometimes-consistency-sometimes- betrayal-all-the-time-just-entertaining "whateverness".

I the series gets a 6 because it started out pretty good, but is barely hanging on in my opinion. I'm an avid Stephen King reader, but had not read this book yet. After 5 or 6 episodes, the story seemed to have too many side plots that didn't seem to have anything to do with the main plot of how the dome came about so bought the book (2 part) and couldn't put it down. I only occasionally watch the series since reading the book - mainly out of curiosity to see how it is progressing. I just can't see how they will drag e series on for more than another season and keep the viewer's interest, especially with the slow pace and all the time spent on side plots. This should have been a three or four part mini-series like what was done with King's "The Stand." I enjoyed that book AND the mini-series.