Being Erica Review
The Toronto Based Time-Travel Dromedy Showing on SOAPnet
New Canadian comedy-drama series, Being Erica, comes to the States via SOAPnet, which normally airs repeats of daily network soap operas and teen soaps. SOAPnet scrubs up its schedule with the less bubble-headed show airing weekly on Thursdays.
Plot of Being Erica
Erica Strange, played by Erin Karpluk, goes to therapist Dr. Tom, played by Michael Riley thinking that she should discuss her many regrets. Instead, following her therapist having her write a list of her regrets, Dr. Tom decides to make their sessions more practical by sending Erica back to the time of each regret, allowing her to confront and theoretically change her past, present, and future.
Erin Karpluk as Erica Strange
Canadian television actress, Erin Karpluk, perhaps formerly best known for playing Kate on Godiva’s, shows off her impressive range as she portrays a character in fluctuating stages of life.
Erica, considering both the character’s feelings of insecurity and the character’s unusual current situation, is appropriately surnamed “Strange.” Yet, she is actually a character with whom many viewers can identify. The thirty-two year old Jewish single gets fired from a job she never liked, and worries about her past mistakes forever denting her future prospects.
Karpluk plays the title role lovably. Yet, the character seems to lack something. Erica’s personality is not extensively revealed. Instead, most of the dimensions added to the character revolve around her relationships. Cliché seems to best describe some of these relationships, such as her initially strained relationship with her mother, while other relationships of hers are of more interest. However, most of these relationships still seem to be simply the premise for setting up plot ploys. For example, the death of Erica’s brother Leo, the divorce of Erica’s parents, the adultery within the marriage of her best friend who moves in next door to her, and her sister’s suggested loveless marriage to her own childhood sweetheart.
The Episodes of Being Erica
Each weekly episode shows Erica being sent back to correct a regret of the past, but thus far, the past occurrence has been made worse rather than better by traveling back to change it. Instead each week Erica seems to learn that her regret from the past was not actually as much a mistake as she thought, and by changing her past, usually for the worse or more embarrassing, she learns to change how she thinks about her present self and future life.
Reception
The theory behind the idea for the show is clever, but, the same lesson being taught again and again, seems a tedious idea for a weekly show. It would be a good final lesson for a film or miniseries, but how many times can the same lesson be taught to the pitiable protagonist?
Why would audiences want to watch a regretful character further humiliate herself week after week? Audiences have answered that they do not!
Unsurprisingly, the intriguing storyline attracted a respectable level of initial viewers, but since the show first aired on Canadian channel CBC Television, viewership has steadily decreased, falling by ten percent in less than two months of weekly episodes.
Being Erica, created by Emmy-Award winning producer Jana Sinyor, can be enjoyable to watch, but it lacks the fine tuning needed to fulfill its promise.
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