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It's pilot season again. And every year, there are at least a few clunkers among the crop of new shows. Pilot Mercy is one of those weak links in the brand-new season.
The writing is clunky. The acting is generally stilted and awkward. The show employs clichés like a tough-as-nails Iraq veteran with a heart of gold whose main character arc is that she's having trouble re-entering civilian life. She also performs a MacGyver-like emergency technique on the street with (no kidding) a bendy straw, vodka and a knife.
In keeping with the clichéd situations are equally awkward lines. When a doctor says to main character Veronica (Taylor Schilling), "We need to treat this disease," she replies, "Well, I treat the patient!"
The suspiciously model-beautiful actors and quasi-quirky soundtrack bring to mind the early days of Grey's Anatomy. But Mercy has neither the style nor the good writing of Grey's.
One bright spot in the show is Michelle Trachtenberg's turn as a plucky, sheltered, ivy-educated nurse from Lancaster, PA. She wholeheartedly throws herself into the role of a sort of Gidget in cartoon-character scrubs and earns well-deserved chuckles for the effort.
Nevertheless, very little is going to salvage the clumsy and cringe-worthy Mercy.
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I was excited to test out this show last night, after hearing reminders on slacker.com all afternoon.
But, after watching not even five minutes of Mercy, I felt awkward and slighty embarassed for sitting through it, and I think the characters did too.
Was this girl really throwing whiskey bottles? Did her stable, grounded boyfriend really get in a trashy bar fight at their engagement party?
Her ex-love Dr. McAwkward might be around that PA hospital for two years, but I don't think we'll be around to see it.
Awful. Predictable. Poor writing. I did not sympathize with the characters at all. All they did was whine and complain and feel sorry for themselves.
I am not going to watch again. Show some 'mercy' and can this show.
Oh gosh, this was awful! I was glad my husband wasn't home or I would have been embarrassed to admit how excited I was to see it. Mix in some ER, Grey's Anatomy and suck the life right out of it....ad some really horrible cliches around nursing ( I am an RN and sure haven't spoken like like, nor have my co-workers)... and you have Mercy. That DVR recording was quickly cancelled!