Surface

39
Metascore
2005-2006
1 season
NBC
Action & Adventure, Drama, Suspense, Science Fiction
TV-14

What do naval officers in the South Antarctic Sea, a family in Wilmington, N.C., the oceanographic institute in Monterey, and fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico all have in common? They're all about to be the first to meet a new form of sea life -- it's beautiful, the kids may even want to play with it, and it likes to make the water warm. But what they don't know yet is that they are on the verge of a world disaster. "Surface" is a series full of continuously evolving twists that deliver across several long-term arcs.

39
Metascore
2005-2006
1 season
NBC
Action & Adventure, Drama, Suspense, Science Fiction
TV-14

Surface: Burning Questions Answered!

Talk about making a splash: Surface, NBC's freshman sea-creature feature, signed off last Monday with a finale filled with lots of tidal waves and slithery beasties — if not satisfying answers about what exactly is going on. TVGuide.com had the pleasure of picking the brain of series cocreator Josh Pate by hitting him with some burning questions (including, yes, "Will Surface be back in the fall?") TVGuide.com: Was it always the plan to have all the principals finally unite in the first-season finale?Josh Pate: Yes. Yes it was. We always wanted to 'cross the streams.'" At first NBC gave us a full pickup, and then they gave us this weird 15 [episode] order, so where the finale fell was changed around, but we always wanted the characters

Tue, Feb 14, 2006

Surface: Burning Questions Answered!

Mon, Feb 13, 2006

Will Surface be returning ...

Question: Will Surface be returning next season?Answer: Based on the ratings for Monday's finale — it finished in fourth place with 9.5 million viewers — I'm going to go out on a limb and say no.

Wed, Feb 8, 2006

Surface Well, folks, if you're...

SurfaceWell, folks, if you're a fan of this show, all I can say is you'd better hope there's gonna be a Season 2. As finales go, this one's heavy on action and light on, oh, I don't know, answers? Where does the great big Noah's Ark of monorails go? Is Jackson really alive and well somewhere in the Iderdex labs? Are the sea monsters responsible for the catastrophic East Coast "double tsunami," or are they just taking advantage of some totally tubular waves? And, for the love of all that is holy, what has become of the talking monkey girl? I'll admit it, that thundering, beastie-filled wall of water is quite possibly the coolest thing we've seen on Surface so far. Well, that and some long-overdue face time with a by-turns irritated, nonchalant and irrepres

Tue, Feb 7, 2006

Surface Wow, not a good day to...

SurfaceWow, not a good day to be an eerily attractive clone. You wake up in the morning, have a nice cup of coffee at your desk, and the next thing you know, you're hogtied with duct tape and crammed into the trunk of a Dodge Stratus. (And a big shout-out to Will Ferrell for making that the funniest car name in automotive history. "Don't talk about my Dodge Stratus!") It's enough to make a guy put a bullet in his own brain. No, wait, scratch that — it's enough to make a guy sit real still for a momentary misdirect before letting a hysterical Dr. Laura go. Meanwhile, Crazy-Eyed Rich gets busted in the Great Big Cryo-Lab of Doom, and Miles nearly gets himself tarred and feathered by an angry mob of townsfolk. Oh, sure, you electrocute one bully in the schoolyard and

Tue, Jan 31, 2006

Surface "I thought it was gonna...

Surface"I thought it was gonna kill me. I really did." Are you referring to the talking monkey girl, or this episode in general? 'Cause if it's the latter, well then, Crazy-Eyed Rich, I'm right there with you. What the hell is going on? We've got two, count 'em, two episodes left to get all this business wrapped up before the "finale" (be it season or series), and we're choosing now to introduce the idea that creepy Agent Lee is actually an ageless genetic-engineering pioneer? What? No, really. What? And to top it all off, he's gonna have my girl Martha Plimpton whacked? But she just got here! With her geeky little outfits and delightfully spunky haircut and the having of actual answers! Now I'm never gonna get the chance to thank her for drugging Dr. Laura and lea

Tue, Jan 24, 2006

How "Goos" It with Surface's Miles?

Poor Miles. Not only did the Surface teen have a brush with death after getting nipped by one of the sea beasties, and not only is his scientist buddy starting to diss him, but his first make-out session with the aquarium-gift-shop cutie got all icked up by ethereal goo secreting from his hands. (As if prepubescence isn't hard enough!) TVGuide.com spoke with Carter Jenkins about his character's crummy luck and Surface's race to the season-finale finish line, kicking off Jan. 23 at 8 pm/ET on NBC. TVGuide.com: Dude, what's with the goo?! Miles finally gets to mack on the babe, and whammo, otherworldly messiness. And that's on top of the fact that his last near-kiss was part of a prank. But that hussy

Mon, Jan 16, 2006

Surface You know, back in September...

SurfaceYou know, back in September when this show premiered and we first started wondering where the sea beasties came from, never in a million years would my guess have been Martha Plimpton. Way to keep us guessing, writers! Dr. Laura's boneheaded decision-making skills continue to reach ever more death-defying heights: This hour alone she manages to almost answer the door for rogue government agents, reply to an e-mail from an unknown sender while they're on the lam, agree to ditch Crazy-Eyed Rich in favor of Crazy-Eyed Plimpton (you just can't tell 'cause she's wearing sunglasses) and go gallivanting off into the wide blue yonder in a tiny prop plane and a blindfold. No wonder the feds have been so successful at discrediting your professional reputation there, Doc — not so much with the

Tue, Jan 10, 2006

Surface Wait, what's going on?...

Surface Wait, what's going on? Is Nimrod dead? Are Dr. Laura and Crazy-Eyed Rich still all cold and pruney from their whole shipwreck saga? It's a bit hazy after a five-week hiatus. (And while we're on the topic, these long-as-hell breaks between new episodes are really dragging down prime time. You hear me, Lost? I'd have a tough enough time remembering where we left off without the 60-plus pounds of turkey and a fair amount of nog muddying up the ol' brain cells. So add another bullet point to the "why I can't wait to cozy back up to Jack Bauer" list: an uninterrupted season.) With little or no fanfare, Rich and Laura turn out to be well enough to go on the lam with their all-important sea-beastie footage, while Miles comes to terms with the heart-wrenching death of Nim

Tue, Jan 3, 2006

FARRELL FIGHTS DEPENDENCY

Colin Farrell is being treated for exhaustion and a dependency on prescription medication he'd been taking for a back injury, the actor's publicist announced on Monday. Should Farrell need added incentive to get back on track, Surface looker Lake Bell is in talks to play his wife in Pride & Glory, a feature drama slated to start filming in February.

Tue, Dec 13, 2005

Hey man, I'm still waiting ...

Question: Hey man, I'm still waiting for some news on my favorite undersea adventure, Surface. Answer: Your wait is over, Matt! Daughtery will finally learn who/what is behind the whole critter conspiracy from a chatty Stanford grad who was recruited years ago to work on the top-secret project. Elsewhere, Miles is going to find himself in more hot water when he and a new female friend break into Fort Fisher after hours to play with his little lizard. (Get your mind out of the gutter. This is a family show.)

Wed, Nov 23, 2005

QUEENS FOR A DAY

King of Queens' Carrie (Leah Remini) has landed her most high-profile real-estate client yet: Kirstie Alley. As reported in today's fresh Ask Ausiello, the former Fat Actress — playing what's left of herself — will hire Carrie to help her find a loft in Soho. The episode is slated to air in January. Also in today's AA: Scoop on Veronica Mars, Lost, Surface, Joey, Boston Legal, Desperate Housewives, Prison Break, House, Battlestar Galactica, ER, Las Vegas and much, much more!

Wed, Nov 23, 2005

Surface You know, this show keeps...

SurfaceYou know, this show keeps striving to emulate Spielberg, but this week, I couldn't get the darker side of Walt Disney out of my head. For starters, the entire plotline, which finds Dr. Laura and Crazy-Eyed Rich stranded at the bottom of the ocean, had me constantly making up highly inappropriate lyrics for "Under the Sea" — you remember that calypso confection from The Little Mermaid that effectively ruined the bulk of 1990. (A brief example of my handiwork: "The oxygen's always greener in somebody else's tank; if Lake Bell dies in this episode, maybe they

Tue, Nov 22, 2005

Lake Bell: We've Only Scratched the Surface

There's something in the water on NBC's Surface (Mondays at 8 pm/ET), and as the series dives deep into sweeps with one revelation-packed episode after another, rest assured that each discovery will be offset by a new mystery. As oceanographer Laura Daughtery, Lake Bell joins Jay R. Ferguson's fisherman, Rich Connelly, in investigating otherworldly sea creatures that somebody (of course) would rather have kept under wraps. TVGuide.com chatted with Bell about making her massive prime-time splash. TVGuide.com: This month the show has really heated up. I mean, people are dying and stuff!Lake Bell: [Laughs] I know! It's going to get crazy. I swear to god, the things we're shooting now I can't even b

Mon, Nov 14, 2005

Lake Bell: We've Only Scratched the Surface

It's getting pretty impressive...

It's getting pretty impressive here, folks. So far we've seen Lake Bell in bikinis, wet T-shirts, cutesy waitress short shorts, and now we've got her jumping into the ocean sporting nothing but her Victoria's not-so-Secrets. There was so much focus on Dr. Laura's bodacious boobs this week, I kept forgetting to pay attention to the thousand-and-one plotlines because all I could think was, am I too young to need a mammogram? Sweeps has begun, ladies and gentlemen. Her Buxomness and Crazy-Eyed Rich enlist good-natured conspiracy theorist Jackson to help them get to a safe house somewhere off the grid — and when I say safe house, I mean deserted beachfront shanty. Gee, what a perfect spot to sit like ducks until the government goons hunt you down! Or, as it turns out, to build your own makeshift deep-submergence vehicle. Because that's gonna end well. Meanwhile, Miles and Phil go all Thelma & Louise in a stolen pizza-delivery car, only with le

Tue, Nov 8, 2005

Creepy Scientist Guy has a eureka...

Creepy Scientist Guy has a eureka moment — something to do with a heat lamp, a jellyfish and quite possibly, the movie Gattaca. (Without the thick sexual tension between Jude Law and Ethan Hawke, natch.) Bottom line: He "know[s] where it comes from." No, wait, new bottom line: Dude just got run over. Before the opening credits. So then, sea monsters? Not that scary. Government goons hell-bent on a cover-up? Scary. Not only did Cirko see the underside of an SUV within seconds of sussing out some crucial monster-from-the-deep DNA evidence, but now his lab lackey Singh (you remember: the face-flaying guy who made a miraculous recovery) manages to impale himself on some sort of pointy instrument during a desperate getaway attempt. That's not pretty. And hey, would anyone care to congratulate me on finally learning Cirko's name? Only took me six weeks! Of course, it figures he bites it before the episode's over. Singh, too. Looks like you're on your own in

Tue, Oct 25, 2005

Well, on the upside, this week...

Well, on the upside, this week our marine-biologist-waitress-heroine Laura finally got up close and personal with one of the big bad sea monsters. And when I say big, I mean, big — like something Donald Trump would try to build out of gold big. On the downside, we didn't really get any of the rock -'em, sock-'em apocalyptic events we've grown so used to over the last few episodes. No massive sinkholes drying up entire lakes. No enormous jaws swallowing boats whole. And darn it, no lava-spewing geysers or exploding playhouses. Surface, you can't set me up with these sorts of expectations and then leave me with angry radar blips and a beach full of dead calamari. We do get to a bit of expository housekeeping, though: Creepy Scientist Guy informs us (and a roomful of very uncomfortable government types) that this new unknown species is an invasive one, blah blah, tip the balance of the oceanic ecosystem, blah blah, near-unintelligible accent, blah blah, om

Tue, Oct 11, 2005

This week on Surface or, as I...

This week on Surface or, as I prefer to call it, "Lake Bell Has Really Tan Legs," we learn several more key elements in the sea monster mystery. Perhaps most important: You may think you're safe if you move your water-sport shenanigans to a freshwater lake, but apparently the ground can still open up and create a bottomless whirlpool of death. OK, oceans bad. Lakes bad. We can still hang out at Yellowstone, right? Wrong. Old Faithful's trying something a little new this year, and it's called spewing molten lava. Sorry, campers. So Miles is still having big electrocute-y fun with little Nimrod, and Laura's trying to get her career back on track by, uh, waiting tables and holding clandestine meetings with Creepy All-Knowing Scientist Guy. But this episode's high drama pretty much belongs to Rich, who isn't handling his brother's death all that well. He comes off looking pretty normal when you compare him to the other nut jobs trying to uncover the world's Hidden Biology

Tue, Oct 4, 2005

Tuesday night, 8:22 pm. That's...

Tuesday night, 8:22 pm. That's when they got me. If you were here last week, you know I was skeptical about this whole sea-monster situation — and I must confess, I tuned in to Episode 2 with my eyes primed and ready to roll. And then I saw the baby beastie. How cute was that thing? I kinda want one to swim around in my bathtub and electrocute my goldfish. Yeah, yeah, so it'll grow up to eat aircraft carriers and possibly take over the Earth — but lookit! With the blinky eyes and little flippers! Can we keep him? Meanwhile, Dr. Laura (not that one), her son and Fisherman Rick snoop around the South Carolina coast trying to get a glimpse of the beached "whale" that's got the military's skivvies in a bunch. Poor impressionable Jesse, decked out in camouflage and crouching in a hagfish-filled swamp, finally has to wonder, "Mom, are we breaking the law?" You know whose kids don't have to ask that question? People who have baby-sitters. Just a suggestion. On

Tue, Sep 27, 2005

Maybe it's because I'm originally...

Maybe it's because I'm originally a prairie girl from the great landlocked state of Oklahoma, but come on, sea monsters? Not that scary. Just don't go in the water. I guess that's easier said than done if you're a SoCal marine biologist (Lake Bell), a Gulf Coast fisherman (Jay R. Ferguson) or an Outer Banks beach-bum-in-training (Carter Jenkins). These three haven't met yet (see also, why pilots suck), but something tells me they're about to team up and take on the government to discover just what's lurking beneath the waves. The premiere finds our heroes in their respective corners of the U.S., each going toe-to-fin with a big, bad underwater beastie. Or, in young Miles' case, the cute little spawn of said beastie. (Seriously, kid, can we not put our fingers in the sea-goo? That can't be sanitary.) Blah blah science talk, blah blah fisherman talk, we've never seen a creature like this before, blah blah. Exposition 2, Action 0. OK,&

Tue, Sep 20, 2005

Will NBC's Surface Be the New Lost?

On Sept. 19 at 8 pm/ET, NBC will unveil Surface, an expansive drama/adventure series that centers on the appearance of mysterious sea creatures in the ocean. Where did these strange life forms come from? And are they as innocent as they appear? Similar questions have haunted the many, many fans of Lost. Surface, though, may have learned one important lesson from the ABC hit: Don't keep 'em guessing too long about too much. Jonas Pate, who created and executive-produces the series with his brother, Josh, tells TVGuide.com that, despite the numerous teases and cliff-hangers scattered throughout the premiere episode, Surface won't be quite as cruel as Lost and its forever-enigmatic island beast. "Believe it or not, we're not going to be as coy with revealing things as you might expect, because th

Mon, Aug 29, 2005