Les Médiums

"The Others" is a curious show. An ensemble cast stumbles their way through a seemingly perpetual stormy night, dabbling in the occult and generally having Scooby Doo hijinks, only with more backlighting and less running around and cries of "Zoinks!"

On the downside, the characters and actors are fairly anodyne and uninvolving, and there are too many of them for the viewer to identify with any of them in particular. The dialogue tends towards the cliched, and the acting is occasionally over the top and verging on the farcical.

Plusses though: the cinematography is excellent, with a genuine sense of tension and claustrophobia. This is difficult to sustain, but "The Others" does a fine job of it. Or rather, *did* a fine job of it, before it was cancelled.

Like "Space, Above and Beyond", Wong and Morgan have created a show that you want to like more than you really do. It's easy to convince yourself that "The Others" is a better show than it actually is. It's good, but not great, the sort of show that you'll happily watch if it's on, but not one that you'll go out of your way to catch if it's in an awkward timeslot, and that was it's bane. Special interest shows have to be much better than average to break out into the mainstream. "X Files" managed it, "The Others" failed.

Some may compare this show to "The X-Files", but I think that this takes the more psychological way out of mysteries, while "The X-Files" solves by way of medical evidence. Since tonight's episode was the first repeat, I thought I would come on to this board to review it. The past 7 or 8 episodes were outstanding, some of my favorites (and scariest) being the pilot episode, "Eyes", "Theta", and that one with the wallpaper (I forgot what that ep. was called). Julianne Nicholson is a great newcomer...I liked her in last year's "Storm of the Century", which I thought was great, as well. I also love the stupidness of Kevin J. as Warren...most will probably remember him from "The Mummy". Bottom line is, I hope this show doesn't get cancelled -- I'm glad they moved it from 10PM to 9PM, probably to get a bigger audience. It's a great show and should be more recognized.

This show was original and entertaining. I liked the characters and the supernatural basis the show was based upon and i looked forward to each episode.Each character had a specific type of 6th sense and Elmer, the group leader was the most powerful psychic of the group but Marian was quickly becoming a powerful psychic herself yet not in control of her abilities.Souls on board and 1112 are just a couple of favorite episodes but i liked them all.Kristen Cloke made for an interesting villain for the group. The series was too short to continue developing the characters which would have made for an even more interesting show. I agree that this isn't for everybody but for those who like originality, then this is for you. Hopefully, the complete series will hit DVD soon and who knows, Sci-Fi channel may decide to pick up the episodes and resurrect the series after a nearly 4 year slumber (wishful thinking). Thanks to Glen Morgan and James Wong for attempting a great series that a lot of people were unfortunate enough to miss.

It's a shame that this show didn't last longer because it deserved to. There's very few shows like this available on television. I found it genuinely creepy which is very rare. The subject matter is treated seriously and the writing is very good with interesting story lines. The viewing audience is treated with respect unlike most shows in this genre that are very formulaic and only appeal to the lowest common denominator. The cast is likable and the characters are all conflicted which helps build the drama. Perhaps most importantly, the thrills and chills are honestly earned through the stories, not through cheap stunts. The wonderfully creepy atmosphere supports the stories rather than the reverse. I would highly recommend this show to fans of the supernatural genre.

I always enjoyed watching this TV-series with a supernatural basis. In my opinion it had lots of potential and could had become the new "The X-Files". The 'low' budget was however painfully notable at times with its special effects and it was obvious that the creators had to restrain themselves with the stories for the different episodes because of the 'lack' of money. I'm positive that with some more money this TV-series could had become a big success but unfortunately they stopped the show after one season.

The characters were all solid and all had their own interesting background. The characters were most definitely strong and interesting enough to carry the series.

My favorite episode most definitely was "Souls On Board", later I found out that that episode was directed by no one less then Tobe Hooper who made the movies "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre" (1974) and "Poltergeist" (even though I'm still convinced of it that Spielberg did the most directing on that movie, I think Hooper only did some of the technical aspects on that movie.).

I'm sorry it must have been years since I've watched an episode of "The Others" but I seem to remember that the series had a good opening theme composed by Klaus Badelt, who is now a much better known and acclaimed composer for movies like "The Time Machine" and "Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl". A bit off topic but you should also check his musical score for "K-19: The Widowmaker" out. It's a score worth owning but unfortunately not one easy to get. The score for the series itself was composed by highly underrated composer Shirley Walker, who worked with Danny Elfman as an orchestrator and conductor for years.

If you get the chance of watching "The Others" on TV as reruns, make sure to do so then. The series is worth your time and has solid characters and some good writing. Unfortunately this series will most likely not be easy to catch and I also don't think that they are ever going to give it a DVD release. A shame because this series had tons of potential and is worth to be seen by everyone.

8/10

P.S.: Oh and could someone please remove the Nicole Kidman poster on this page! This series has absolutely nothing to do with the 2001 movie "The Others" starring Nicole Kidman and directed by Alejandro Amenábar.

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