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In Victorian England, young and beautiful Alice tells an impossible tale of a strange new land that exists on the other side of a rabbit hole. An invisible cat, a hookah-smoking caterpillar and playing cards that can talk are just some of the fantastic things she's seen during her adventure. Surely this troubled girl must be insane. Her doctors intend to cure her with a treatment that will make her forget—everything. Alice seems ready to put it all behind her, especially the painful memory of the genie she fell in love with and lost forever, the handsome and mysterious Cyrus. But in her heart Alice knows this world is real, and just in the nick of time the sardonic Knave Of Hearts and the irrepressible White Rabbit arrive to save her from her fate. Together the trio will take a tumble down the rabbit hole to a Wonderland where nothing is impossible.
This spinoff of ABC's successful series "Once Upon A Time" was originally conceived as a limited-run event that would air through the winter hiatus of its parent show to fill the gap for fantasy fans. But apparently ABC had so much faith in their new show that they scrapped that idea and instead moved it to the fall season, where it's now airing concurrently with the original OUAT. It's still supposedly a one-and-done series, but if ratings were good enough, I'm sure ABC wouldn't hesitate to draw it out as long as possible. (See CBS' "Under The Dome" for another example of a supposedly "limited" series suddenly being renewed for a second season due to excellent ratings.)
But perhaps ABC was a tad overeager with their rescheduling. "Wonderland" probably would have worked better in its originally-conceived format -- it's not substantial enough to warrant its own full series, and it's already floundering in the overstuffed primetime fall schedule. The show premiered on Thursday to a paltry 1.7 rating, which is under the 1.9 rating that ABC's "Last Resort" got in the same time slot exactly one year ago...and that show was cancelled halfway through its first season. (In fact, the 8pm on Thursday slot has been notoriously difficult for ABC to fill. No show that's premiered there in the past couple of years has lasted, including the likes of "Charlie's Angels", "Missing", and "Zero Hour".)
The reason "Wonderland" would have made an ideal midseason time-filler is the simplicity of its story. Despite the setup where a grown Alice is confined to an insane asylum for her insistent belief in a fantastical kingdom, the rest of the pilot presents a very straightforward story. Alice has to journey back to Wonderland to find her lost love and save him from the clutches of two conniving villains. Get in, get the man, get out. Done and done.
Of course, being the child of the overly-complicated OUAT, there are unnecessary sidetracks here, too. For some reason, the Red Queen wasn't seen as enough of an antagonist for Alice, so they had to throw in Jafar as well. Yes, the nefarious Royal Vizier from "Aladdin" is now a magic-carpet-riding, beard-stroking villain who flies through Wonderland throwing people in ridiculously elaborate prisons. Also as a nod to "Aladdin", the man that Alice falls in love with and has to rescue is a genie named Cyrus. This blending of "Alice In Wonderland" and "Aladdin" is as bizarre as it is unexpected. Add in some very cheap-looking special effects, obvious green screen acting, and stilted dialogue, and you have a recipe for disaster.
Pretty much the only worthwhile part of the show thus far is (some of) the acting. The White Rabbit, while an entirely CGI creation, is voiced by John Lithgow ("Dexter"), whose instantly-recognizable timbre lends a playful tone to the episode. Michael Socha (BBC's "Being Human"), a striking Jake Gyllenhaal lookalike, is rakishly fun as Alice's ally the Knave Of Hearts. And Sophie Lowe ("Adore") as Alice herself fares surprisingly well in a shakily-written role. There are far too many scenes of Alice swooning and/or pining over Cyrus to make her a compelling role model, so the writers attempt to balance the weepy romance with scenes of Alice pummeling bad guys in hand-to-hand combat. Both extremes of the character are equally ridiculous, and they probably wouldn't work if it weren't for the tenacious performance that Lowe delivers. But alas, a couple solid performances are not enough to keep this candy-colored confection from slipping inevitably down the rabbit hole into absurdity.
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DPj3vR5d9k[/youtube]
