It’s more than a mission, Eve.
Main Cast: Natalie Zea, Eoin Macken
Creator: David Appelbaum
The first thing you need to know about La Brea is that it is not stellar television. But I’m going to make a case for it anyway, because I don’t always need stellar. Sometimes I’m in the mood for nostalgia and silliness.
La Brea, which ran on NBC for three seasons from 2021-24, is a time travel story. The series begins with a giant sinkhole opening in Los Angeles. Those who survive the fall find themselves in 10,000 BC.
So right there you know that this is either going to defy its ridiculous premise or lean into it. It leans, hard.
Our main characters are the Harris family. Parents Gavin and Eve and teenagers Izzy and Josh. When we meet them, Gavin is a bit of a mess, Eve is thinking about leaving him, and the kids are caught in the middle. You would think that those things would go away once you fall in a sinkhole, but you would be wrong. There is a lot of family hand-wringing to be found here.
There are plenty of other survivors as well, and the group has to figure out how to survive the slings and arrows of the past and find a way to get home.
Friends, did anyone else grow up watching The Land of the Lost on Saturday mornings? If you did, this show is for you. The special effects are nothing special, the storylines are tortured, and the characters are ridiculous. I must emphasize, these are all good things. La Brea feels like a blast from the past, when we didn’t worry about things like continuity, plausibility, or acting.
The series is straight-up escapist fun, with every character taking their situation very, very seriously. It doesn’t take long for the time machines to show up and then we’re hopping all over the place, from 10,000 BC to 1988 to 1965. During season three, I was delighted with the introduction of some dinosaurs from an even more distant past.
La Brea will not be for everyone. It’s a perfect series to watch when you’re doing something else. Background noise for cooking or knitting or doomscrolling. If you’re a Gen Xer who fondly remembers Cha-ka and the Sleestacks, you’ll have fun with the Harris family and their sinkhole.
Sue reads a lot, writes a lot, edits a lot, and loves a good craft. She was deemed “too picky” to proofread her children’s school papers and wears this as a badge of honor. She is also proud of her aggressively average knitting skills. TV and indie movies are her jam.
Leave a Reply