https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rp6KWn48ufc
When I was kid, I saw a little movie called Time After Time. I don’t know what it was about that film, but it made me become obsessed with time travel and Jack the Ripper. An obsession, I still have to this day. That was my takeaway from it the 1980 classic, but it was not Kevin Williamson’s. He told me at a press event this week for the ABC Sci-Fi drama that debuts tonight at 9p on ABC, it made him a fan of H.G. Wells’ books. Time After Time is based on the book by the legendary author. Since the lauded Director is a fan of Wells, you know he is going to give the TV show based on his novel justice. He does and I can’t wait to see where he goes with the tale.
Wait up! Getting in my time machine to go back in time and tell you what Time After Time is about. Back in 1893, H.G. Wells (Freddie Stroma) has not yet written his first book, but he has built a time machine. He shows it off to his friends, one who has a secret. Dr John Stevenson (Josh Bowman) is the notorious Jack the Ripper.
When the police come for Stevenson, he escapes in the time machine to our time. Now, Wells is going to go after him.
When Wells arrives in our time, Jane (Génesis Rodríguez), the curator whose museum is housing Wells’ invention, greets him. She doesn’t believe that the inventor of the museum’s prize possession is standing in front of her. Therefore, she lets him go.
A few hours after she lets him go, the museum’s wealthy owner Vanessa Anders (Nicole Ari Parker) visits her and she wants to know where the two men who came to her via the time machine are. She tells Jane to find them or she will be fired.
A few hours after that, Wells and Stevenson meet up at a hotel lobby and the cat and mouse chase begins. Just as Wells chases after his cat, he is hit by a car and taken to the hospital.
The only ID Wells had on him is Jane’s business card, so they contact her. The two are reunited and she takes the stranger home with her. She again asks him who is he, and again he tells her he is Wells. She doesn’t believe that the man standing in front of her is someone who lived over 100 years ago. Do you blame her?
Eventually he finally convinces her that he is whom he says he is by taking her to the future. That is when they learn, she is the cheese that the cat will use to lure in his mouse.
And that is just the beginning of the season that is about two men from the past living in our time trying to stop the other one. One is inherently good, the other is evil. There is one woman who understands and knows them both. What happens next no one knows. Which is why I wish I had a time machine, so I can fast forward in time to next week to see the next episode.
Like I said, earlier this week I was at a press event with Kevin Williamson, Josh Bowman and Génesis Rodríguez. They talked about a lot of things about the excellent show, and Williamson explained his Jack the Ripper. He told us, “Jack the Ripper comes to modern day, who is this serial killer who in his day, and as he clearly pointed out, it wasn’t just women he was interested in. We are not doing the dark history of his mother damaging him and for some reason he is seeking out women of the night in alleyways. He is doing it because it’s opportunity. he has a Gd complex. The only thing greater than going into a hospital and saving a human life is taking it. And he can’t do that in his profession because he is a narcissist. He has to win and be the best at everything, so the only way to express that impulse is to go out to the alleyways and kill vagrants and homeless men where there is opportunity.
“But when he gets to modern day New York, he has a crisis of conscience. He comes up and says, ‘Okay, I kill people. That’s what I do. I’m sick. I get it.’ And he reads about himself and sees how sick and twisted he is and goes, ‘Okay. I need a makeover. I need to reinvent myself.’ There has got to be another way I can exploit my sickness. He even sees it in himself. He can change. Jane evens points it out in episode 2. He is sitting at the bar drinking thinking, ‘Do you think people really can change,’ and we are going to see if Jack the Ripper really can change. He changes his MO a little bit. He isn’t as targeted in being this serial killer, but he is targeted in being the evil of all evil.” Understanding that makes you even more compelled to watch this drama that has stood the test of times.
Since Time After Time is a movie that has been near and dear to my heart for most of my life, I was very critical of the show’s first two episodes. What Williamson did was to exceed my expectations of brilliant television with this adaptation. Whether you are a fan of the book, the film or never heard of it, you are going to be infatuated with Time After Time from the very first second you watch it. It is a real page turner, you won’t want to shut off.
