Kitsch, when wielded properly, can produce masterpieces — the Teletubbies, movies about horses, so on. It's the kind of personalized, winking absurdity that makes shows like "Jersey Shore" shine. Unfortunately, CBS' new government-themed comedic drama "CHAOS" just doesn't quite get it.
The show is about Rick Martinez (Freddy Rodriguez), a rookie CIA agent whose life falls apart during his first day at the office (and in such zany ways!) Driving to work, he's mistaken for a terrorist and pinned down by a SWAT team. While bafflingly (and delightfully) stupid, scenes like this are not the show's actual problem. The real trouble begins when "CHAOS" tries not to be stupid, thereby rendering itself even dumber.
Right from the start, the show attempts to mock the efficiency of government-run intelligence programs, which proves a fatal error. The moment the plot tries to tackle a real-life issue in a clever way, the show loses its surreal nature and all the punch lines fall flat and tired. "CHAOS" would be much better off if it stopped trying to be funny, because the show's contrived and preposterous storylines are already dumb enough to keep viewers entertained.
Once Rick resolves his series of comic fiascos, the premise boils down to this: He joins a small group of CIA agents in the Office of Disruptive Services (or ODS, a name vague enough to allow their actual job to vary in every episode) and travels with them to random countries around the world in accordance with whichever goofy plot conflict arises. In the second episode, for example, the spies pretend to be anti-American documentary filmmakers in order to gain entry into North Korea and save an exiled diplomat's wife by sneaking her over the Chinese border on a tour bus.
This is not an exaggeration. Every storyline really is this remarkably farfetched, which appears to be the show's greatest strength. Not only are these plots aware of their kitsch, but they're also quite original and effortlessly funny at their core. Though viewers will occasionally cringe at the show's illogical twists, no one can deny that Rick swallowing a live scorpion in order to make friends with Sudanese terrorists is simply an awesome idea.
"CHAOS" also presents the rare scenario in which the main character is not the best spy — in fact, Rick serves as more of a guinea pig to his more experienced (and thus more jaded) coworkers. They use and abuse him in astronomically brainless and self-serving ways: In Sudan, they even knock him unconscious and send him to terrorists on a horse as bait. But of course, ODS' crazy antics always work out in the end, somehow. And even though each episode contains upwards of three fight scenes, during which spy Casey Malick (Tim Blake Nelson) impossibly wards off several armed gunmen with his bare hands, there are never any deaths.
Quoth Casey: "I am a human weapon."
Every other scene possesses a little magic moment like that, where the acting, writing and glaring cliches mesh harmoniously to create something relatively pointless but nonetheless amusing. It's too bad that crippled acting, plot inconsistencies and tension between kitsch and taste bog down "CHAOS" with the same proverbial red tape it tries so desperately to destroy.
The pilot episode, for instance, prominently features one female CIA employee, Fay Carson (Carmen Ejogo), who shares a bit of a romance with Rick when she meets him. I was pretty excited for them, especially after Rick said, "I know what you're thinking. How can I be a good spy when I'm blind when it comes to matters of the heart?" Adorably transparent writing.
Anyway, I was actually excited because for the first time (pretty much ever) on a TV show, a Latino man and an African-American woman were assuming the lead romantic roles. It's groundbreaking when you consider how often minority characters are brushed aside to minor plotlines.
But alas, the show randomly introduces (with no explanation) a white, blonde leading woman, Adele Ferrer (Christina Cole) in the second episode, who immediately snatches all of the screen time away from Fay and ever-so-slightly flirts with Rick on top of that. Since Adele's arrival, Fay has appeared in a total of one scene. Not to demonize the white woman or anything (my mom is white, my cat was white), but I'd just really like to see "CHAOS" push some institutionalized television norms the same way it does with its around-the-world rescue plots. In my book, the show is already bad enough to get away with anything. So why not shed the restrictions and trim the BS?
Ultimately, I think the writers of this series are well on their way to liberating themselves. When they're completely free, you can count on me to embrace the chaos.
