Forever Episode Review: "New York Kids"

Guest Stars include Mackenzie Mauzy, Raul Casso, Kett Turton and Meryl Jones Williams.

While, in general at least, I like the overall premise of this series, there have been a couple episodes in its maiden season that really have done very little to distinguish themselves as being anything significantly different from what I’ve seen from other detective shows that are currently on TV. And, unfortunately, this was one of those episodes.

The main point of the series is Henry has been alive for so long, he notices little details others might not notice. And, while there was some of that in this one, his talents were largely wasted and primarily consisted of him noticing a date on a picture and a hidden grave. Unlike other episodes, there wasn’t any sort of question about the cause of death or whether it was murder.

In fact, everything about this episode, to be perfectly honest, was kind of predictable. Once we were introduced to the victim’s ex-friends, it was pretty obvious they were guilty of something. And, as soon as Henry discovered a photo of the friends taking a vacation 10 years before and learning about the doctor’s personality change shortly after, it wasn’t too hard to guess at what happened on that trip.

To be fair, the episode does at least make some effort; to throw the viewer a little bit of a curve ball, at least as far as who murdered the doctor is concerned.  But, it also wasn’t anything that saved the episode either.

The one thing I did like about this episode is we do get a little better understanding about why Henry decided to become a medical examiner. In addition to obviously learning more about his immortality, the idea that he was afraid keeping his secret would potentially prohibit him from keeping his oath to help people was an intriguing one. I just wish the rest of the episode would have done a better job complementing that.

While not necessarily a bad episode overall, it really wasn’t anything overly unique either. And, for this show to really establish itself, it does need to find ways to be better than the average detective show. This episode does not do that.

My Grade: C