One of the new television series this year, Touch started here in Finland two weeks ago. The series is basically about two things. On the surface it tells a story about an autistic boy who doesn't talk but can see the future instead. The boy communicates the future to his father through numbers so that he can influence the surroundings so that good things happen. Under the hood it's more about telling stories about how we're all connected around the world.So it's a fantasy mixed with international stories. It could be interesting, right? Well, I think it fails badly. Here are four reasons why:
- The boy doesn't only predict the future. He also predicts the consequences of his foreseeing, which makes him omniscient to a point where nothing really matters.
- The numeral sequences the boy is dropping are overused. If the primary purpose of the sequence of numbers is a simple thing like a phone number acting as the clue that actually leads the father on right track, why does that same sequence have to make pointless appearances in lottery tickets, coded doors, baseball bats etc.? Is it to try to hide the fact how simple and uncreative the clue actually was? After all, having the sequence all over the place doesn't really add to any "mysteriousness" you know. Instead it just makes you lose interest in trying to even think about it.
- The foreign characters should bring depth to the series, but unfortunately they don't as they don't feel real. This is enforced by the fact that these characters seem to be making implausible admiring references to American entertainment (such as Sopranos and Chris Rock). Due to this the characters are not "touching" but rather just make the storytelling unnecessarily jumpy by introducing new characters all the time.
- Last and least importantly, Kiefer Sutherland doesn't seem to know whether to be soft daddy or Jackbauerishly tough. Sometimes the latter seems to surface in a way that I don't really really suits the character of Martin Bohm or the situations in this series.
