Parents' Guide to

Complications

By Joyce Slaton, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 15+

Gritty, complex drama has intense violence and menace.

TV USA Drama 2015
Complications Poster Image

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USA is clearly going after Breaking Bad territory: Regular dad goes rogue when caught in the fell clutch of circumstances. And it actually does a creditable job within the genre. Jason O'Mara has beady-eyed intensity, and there are some handy writers at work here. The plot ticks along nicely, with lots of medical messes keeping things lively between plot points concerned with the big bad gang guys.

But there's an archaic quality to the proceedings that makes Complications not quite top-drawer. We've seen the medical scenes before; we know their beats intimately. Similarly, any police scenes have a clichéd air: A detective investigating Ellison's role in the a gang battle tells him he's free to leave the station -- but just as he gets to the door, he says, "Just one more thing." Sigh. If you're going to write a dark drama, you can do better than sub-Law & Order dialogue.

TV Details

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