The mainstream shift from television to streaming, which began in 2015-16, saw streaming platforms like Netflix compete with major networks for original TV content. This left a lot of shows buried on both ends, as people were slowly transitioning how they consume media; part of the reason the 2010s stand out as delivering some of the best TV shows of all time. Most TV fans have a few titles from this period that they feel were overlooked or canceled too soon. The 2016 series Second Chance on Fox did indeed not get its second chance to appease fans who tuned in to the modern adaptation of Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus.
Despite only delivering a single season, the show certainly offered viewers a fresh and exciting take on a classic. However, today is the best day to look back on the short-lived series, which debuted ten years ago today, on January 13, 2016, and see how it challenged norms, came up short, but captured a cult following in the process.
‘Second Chance’ Offered a Fresh Take on a Sci-Fi Horror Classic for Television
Second Chance follows Jimmy Pritchard (Robert Kazinsky), a corrupt 75-year-old former King County sheriff who is murdered during a robbery at his son’s home. He is resurrected in the body of a younger man by tech-billionaire twins Mary and Otto Goodwin (Dilshad Vadsaria and Adhir Kalyan) using advanced biotechnology. Rebuilt with heightened abilities, senses, and physical prowess, Jimmy navigates a second chance at life, confronting his past failures while becoming an unofficial protector and fixer for the Goodwins. Matters would become more complicated when Jimmy’s son, FBI agent Duval Pritchard (Tim DeKay), and his granddaughter, Gracie Pritchard (Ciara Bravo), begin investigating the tech company Lookinglass, which is responsible for Jimmy’s resurrection.
Second Chance is an exercise in sheer ambition, offering a rather bizarre blend of drama, sci-fi, and thriller that made its Frankenstein connections strenuous at best; certainly a far cry from other TV and movie adaptations of the classic story. For fans of the novel, the story’s morality was its saving grace in tying it to the literary classic, exploring the themes of moral corruption and personal agency through its flawed protagonist. Further limiting its broader appeal, among the other procedurals at the time, like NCIS and Law & Order: SVU, Second Chance was drastically different tonally, as it did not stick to the ‘guaranteed’ formula for success.
The show refused to stay in a single lane, jumping between genres and its focus in ways that excited many fans. At the same time, the show did not fare well with critics, who saw what some praised as structural flaws and a lack of direction. Moreover, they felt that the show’s larger moral questions were undercut by its case-of-the-week format. Ultimately, at a pivotal moment in TV history, Second Chance could not find ratings through word of mouth alone, and with critics panning it, its grand concept was never given the needed room to grow into the phenomenal series it could have been. The show ran for just eleven episodes, but what it delivered in that single season was, undeniably, one wild ride.
‘Second Chance’ Delivered a Wild Ride of a Single Season
Second Chance certainly took viewers on quite a journey, both narratively and stylistically, across its eleven episodes, leading critics to see it either as a prestige sci-fi drama trapped inside a network procedural, or vice versa. Undeniably, Second Chance was never going to be among the best procedurals or the best sci-fi television shows of its era. Fans tuning in one week would get a more straightforward case-of-the-week format, only to get a sci-fi, superhero-inspired narrative the next. For some, it was a tonal whiplash that fell short, but for those who enjoyed the ride, it remains one of the wildest shows to emerge from the 2010s, whose lifeline was cut short
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