Ah, irony. When Hollywood’s film and TV writers went “pencils down” in last year’s strike over issues like a fair rate for Internet distribution, who knew that one of the byproducts of their newfound downtime would be great online video? We got the Speechless series, we got StrikeTV, and we got musical phenom Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog. But we only almost got The Remnants. And going by the just-released pilot episode, we missed out.
Screenwriter/director John August (Go, Charlie’s Angels, Big Fish, The Nines) teased a snippet of The Remnants back on his always-fantastic web site in October. The hope was that 60Frames and NBC Universal Digital Studio would pony up to shoot subsequent episodes. Now, with the economy uncertain and August’s post-strike schedule tight, more of The Remnants seems unlikely. So instead this week we get the pilot, and only the pilot, and more’s the pity, ’cause it’s pretty darn good.
A hilariously matter-of-fact look at a goofy group of survivors in post-apocalyptic Los Angeles, The Remnants isn’t revolutionary in terms of technology or production values. It is, however, a great example of one of the most elusive of Web beasts: a well-written, well-directed, well-produced comedy that’s actually funny. What’s more, August’s site is geared toward writers, so you can read the script there and see how it started out funny on the page and got funnier when all the talent came together.
Described by August as being a tonal cross “between The Office and The Stand,” The Remnants gives us an end-of-the-world scenario where you raid abandoned kitchens and consider a can of Pringles a triumph, where you score a Wii before realizing you don’t have the electricity to run it, and where that realization leads to a discussion of the time Ed Begley, Jr. gave Helen Hunt a green audit. (“It sounds dirty, but it wasn’t.”)
There’s not a single weak link in the cast, which includes web celebs Ze Frank and Justine Bateman (yeah, we call her a “web celeb” now), alongside Michael Cassidy, Ernie Hudson, Ben Falcone and Amanda Walsh. (With a great cameo by Enrico Colantoni.) Yeah, there’s a moment here and there where the pace seems to drag slightly (a weird pitfall that strikes just about every online video shot with a handheld). On the other hand, what your average web series lacks is a great score, and, when the action’s going, The Remnants has that down — it sounds like the answer to, “give me something like Shaft, only more … jaunty.”
Hope still springs eternal that word of mouth will revive interest and bring the sponsorship dollars rolling in. But until then, Remnants, we hardly knew ye.
See our previous coverage:
