Limitless

The new US Fall season is asking viewers to suspend disbelief an awful lot this year.

Secret agencies that can predict crime, superheroes with startling powers, tattooed victims with their memories wiped -the latest centres around a pill that boosts brain power, courtesy of a 2011 feature film Limitless.

I haven’t seen the thriller that starred Bradley Cooper, which itself is based on the novel The Dark Fields by Alan Glynn.

But if escapism is what America is craving this season, it could do a lot worse than this action drama, starring Jake McDorman.

He plays Brian Finch, a part-time singer-guitarist playing in bands and cafes, who can’t seem to crack the big time. He temps in office jobs in between gigs and does the right thing visiting the family.

But when his father (Ron Rifkin) falls mysteriously ill, Brian’s easy-going life is more challenged.

He tells a music colleague Eli (Arjun Gupta), “I haven’t written a song in over a year. I can’t concentrate, my dad’s sick.”

Eli offers him a solution with a translucent pill, NZT-48 which he assures will “jump start” his life. To Brian’s surprise it allows him to access every one of his brain cells. Knowledge, memory, problem-solving and logic are all firing at 100%. Now he can play the guitar like Hendrix and finish those temp office jobs in record time (and revamp entire office systems in the process).

“The world is mine. You just have to decide what to with it,” he discovers.

More productively, he can quickly research his family tree to get to the bottom of his father’s mystery illness.

But when the pill’s power runs out at 12 hours he goes to Eli to source more -only to discover he has been murdered. Whilst reeling in disbelief in Eli’s apartment, the FBI come bursting through the door and a chase ensues (there’s a fair bit of running in Limitless it seems).

The FBI is headed up here by special agent Nasreen “Naz” Poura (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio) but it is agent Rebecca Harris (Jennifer Carpenter) who gets close to Brian when he tries to convince her he is not Eli’s killer. Their somewhat unlikely bond puts her at odds with her boss, who sees Brian as a criminal.

“He’s a person. A good one actually. Am I the only one seeing that?” Rebecca asks.

“Special Appearance” star, the terribly-blue-eyed Bradley Cooper also surfaces briefly as his original character Senator Eddie Morra. Cooper is also one of the series exec producers, however all the promotion attached to him gives a false sense of what the series is about.

Limitless relies on a fair whack of cat and mouse chasing and cloak & dagger, but carries it off spiritedly. Jake McDorman isn’t particularly distinct but he is likeable, which is probably half the battle won.

Jennifer Carpenter is close to replicating Dexter‘s Debra Morgan, without her trademark swearing, but who cares -she’s always so watchable. Mastrantonio, alas, has nothing much to work with as yet.

The series also uses all its visual FX and editing resources to drive the storytelling: there are multiple Brian Finchers, on-screen text, science recreations and a voice-over.

Brian’s world is now full of bad guys (and not the music career he appeared to desire), which will only make Limitless a perilous weekly diversion.

Limitless premieres 8:30pm Sunday October 11 on TEN.