Grade: B-
I was very reluctant to watch Katherine Heigl’s return to television in State of Affairs. I loved her as Izzie on Grey’s Anatomy before her feud with creator (and TV badass) Shonda Rhimes cost her pretty much a lot, but her rom-com movies have all been pretty dull so far.
So yeah, I REALLY didn’t want to like State of Affairs.
But surprise, surprise! It was actually good.
Let me make one thing clear: this is in no way groundbreaking television (that honor belongs to Showtime‘s The Affair this year) and it’s not captivating and compelling and addicting like Homelandwas back in season 1. But this show KNOWS all that and is trying to be a collection of a bunch of other shows (Homeland, Scandal, The West Wing). And that’s fine because it worked for the Pilot.
Heigl plays Charlie (Charleston), a CIA analyst who delivers the POTUS’s daily briefing. That alone is kind of original. I loved the idea behind this show because it is different than the things we’ve usually come to see. And the Pilot was definitely fast-paced and thrilling enough with twists and turns to make me come back for more.
However, there were definitely a lot of flaws in this first outing. The most annoying thing about the first episode was actually the plot twist delivered at the end. How many episodes until we find out that there’s a mole in the CIA? And how many until we find out Charlie isn’t as good as she seems she is? This felt a bit unoriginal and dull for an hour that had been up to that point pretty entertaining.
I’ll definitely watch more, and write more, on State of Affairs. Until then, I was impressed with the series premiere solely because I wasn’t expecting Heigl to be a good fit for this role.
I was gladly surprised.
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