The River Hits Rough Waters!

Uh-oh, it looks like ABC’s new supernatural suspense series is already taking on water.

By now you’ve probably heard about the ratings for The River, described as Paranormal Activity in the Amazon. In its Tuesday night premiere the Steven Spielberg produced series managed just 7.59 million viewers and a 2.4 18-49 share.

Now those aren’t horrible numbers. I mean we’re not talking NBC here (whose Parenthood pulled in less than 5 million at 10pm) – but there are troubling signs ahead for TV’s new horror show. For starters The River came in third in the demo in its time slot, behind New Girl and NCIS: LA. Then there’s the fact that it will likely lose viewers in future weeks. And most alarming of all – The River lost almost a million and a half viewers over the course of its 2 part, 2-hour premiere. And honestly – who can blame them!

I checked out The River as I’m a huge horror fan! I love True Blood, Walking Dead and American Horror Story. Heck, I’m even producing a TV show about horror movies at the moment via my production company, Savannah Media. But for me The River was all a bit noisy, frantic and banal. Did you feel the same?

By now you know the plot of The River – ABC have trailed the darn thing enough. The plot concerns a group of rescuers who head up the Amazon searching for a famed TV explorer who’s gone missing. But deep in the jungle all is not what it seems… And that’s kind of about it really.

I only watched the first hour of The River – and I understand the second hour was better. But in the ultra competitive broadcast TV landscape you simply don’t get a second chance to make a first impression. Part 2 is now sat on my DVR and there’s really little point in watching it. In a couple of weeks time The River will likely be below the 5 million mark and heading for cancellation – just like last year’s other ABC jungle set series, Off The Map.

For me The River kicked off with some pretty serious pilot flaws. The cast were charmless – especially male lead Joe Lincoln, who was kind of gawky and hard to warm too. There’s a young Spanish girl who doesn’t speak English but appears to understand it perfectly and who keeps gibbering about the supernatural presence lurking in the jungle. Plus let’s not forget the brooding weapons expert who clearly has a secret agenda and the hot babe who turns up in a sweaty vest and acts with her cleavage.

Then there’s Paul Blackthorne (of Lipstick Jungle fame) who plays a stereotypical mercenary TV producer. One the key conceits of The River is that it’s filmed documentary style and we’re now looking at the ‘found footage’ from the group’s expedition. The explorer’s lost boat is also decked out with cameras enabling us to view the action Big Brother style. It’s all very contrived and leads to scenes like the one featuring the two cameramen running around the ship filming the supernatural menace. Except the menace is unseen. So unfortunately what we’re watching is a lot of running, shaky camerawork and trees rustling.

And that’s ultimately The River’s biggest problem. The threat isn’t tangible. True Blood has scary vampires, The Walking Dead has flesh hungry zombies and American Horror Story has the ‘rubber man’. By contrast, The River has wobbly cameras and a threat you can’t see. And chances are when we do see the threat it a) won’t be very scary and b) there will be a whole heap of new mysteries to unravel down the river. It’s just one of those shows. A lot of work for not very much pay off.

I think audiences are a bit more savvy in this post-Lost TV landscape. The ABC hit strung viewers along for years with little reward and was followed by Heroes which also started well before declining to a glacial pace. Since then both Flash Forward and The Event have come out of the gate big but lost viewers fast, leading me to believe that audiences have become wary of high concept series built on a mysterious premise.

Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe The River will grow audiences in the weeks to come. But somehow I doubt it. Personally I think this new ABC show is already sunk.

But what do you think? Do you agree? And what did you make of The River’s premiere? Comment away!