This site has mostly focused on reviewing books I’ve been reading. Tonight, I saw the premiere of Big Sky, a television series based on a book series by C.J. Box. I haven’t read the books, but the teaser for the pilot episode of the show intrigued me.

One thing I really like is that the show includes an androgynous character. The character, who appears to play/pass as a woman, is a prostitute who climbs into the cab of a trucker at a truck stop. The poor thing. Turns out the trucker is a psychopath who tases her and puts her in the trailer of his truck. I really hope the character survives and continues in this series. I think it’s so cool when shows include LGBTQ characters. It shows that television-land acknowledges the diversity of the world and of human experiences. Bravo!

There are two other plot threads. The first is the story of two teenage-ish sisters on a long road trip together. When they don’t show up at their destination, the boyfriend of one of the girls gets his father, Cody, a private investigator, involved. Cody, (played by Ryan Phillipe) gets in contact with a state trooper. Spoiler Alert: the trooper is in cahoots with the crazy trucker guy who has kidnapped the girls and the prostitute. The trooper shoots Cody the PI at the end of the first episode and then gets on the phone to call the trucker and ream him out about how sloppy he’s gotten.

The other plot thread involves Cody the PI and his two women. One woman is his estranged wife, Jenny (played by Katheryn Winnick). The other woman is Cassie, (played by Kylie Bunbury) their friend and partner at the private investigator business they run. The two women are both sleeping with Cody, and one thing I hated about the pilot was when the two women get into a brawl in a bar over Cody. So annoying. Please, writers, give these two women something to do in the next episode besides fight over a man.

Other things I disliked/hated:

–The psycho trucker has a nagging mother, which feels like something I’ve seen too often. The mommy issues remind me of Norman Bates.

–The young girls alone on a deserted road remind me of so many slasher movies. On film, nothing good ever comes out of car trouble at night in a wooded area. The minute the car breaks down, the audience immediately knows what to expect.

I’ll be back next week.