Okay, dead-stop, I see a lot of man babies in the comments crying about the warrior woman trope, as they appear to be shocked that women are roughly 50% of the population. I'm not sure how much more backstory for her they expected in one already-expositional episode. So I'm registering an imdb just to put some things in scale.
Now, I'll be honest, I wouldn't give it a "10" - I'm doing that to offset the completely unwarranted "1"s in the comments made by people who don't understand things like midsummer backdoor network pilot budgets or the fact that Women Exist.
Reasonably, I'd give it a 5 in actual execution (for episode one) but a 9 in concept. So here's the deal.
Outpost already displays vast vision. While their cinematography is still finding its footing and fairly basic, they've already attempted to give us a large world with imposing landscapes just to begin, and there's a huge potential for more in that.
It's VERY throwback. It's been called a love letter to the children of the 80s and 90s and I'm prone to agree with that.
Admittedly the early bit actors were a bit low caliber. Some of the pacing is off but that is very likely an editing room choice and something I am completely okay with giving a few episodes for them to find their rhythm at.
CW kids are spoiled to ideas like Flash and Arrow, which have comic franchise backing, or Supernatural, who had the luck of managing to drag David Nutter on board for their first few episodes - which you mostly know from Game of Thrones. For what I can reasonably expect them to have on call, there's a lot of heart in this.
The story is simple, but in a flexible way; it is a classic fantasy but with all of the trappings we have built around a lot of our other classic fantasies. And before any other manbabies complain about those, sit down and tell me beyond "Kingdoms fight for throne, multiple magic god things" what sets even Game of Thrones apart - dynamic and characters. And we do have a potential set up for that.
It's not above making light fun of itself, with flashback vibes to Pirates of the Caribbean and brief humors that I'm sure they'll find their beat on shortly, and parts of the soundtrack flatter that - but it's entirely original.
The actors felt out their roles fairly actively even through the episode. I can feel Garret's charm begging for a chance to come out and I'm more than willing to give this show a season's run to see where they take that.
In sum, the Outpost is for anyone that grew up on shows like Xena, Warrior Princess. Give Jake enough time to shine as Garret and the manbabies will even have a good male lead to lock onto and compensate their tears over the strong female character being a major lure to the show. Similarly, the cast and crew is engaged and eager, and I imagine reasonable production notes and critique won't go unheard if you know how to not act like a toddler over it.
No tea, just facts.
