Ringer

The CW's tale of an evil twin and an even eviler twin, is devious doppelganger drama at its best.

I'll admit that between the CW and ABC Family, I'm having trouble keeping track of the duos who've been separated at birth, switched at birth, given up at birth and in the case of Ringer, apparently just found themselves drifting apart into different worlds, but by halfway through tonight's pilot, I felt as if I'd seen this one before.

Ringer is no Buffy, so that's enough of that. It is a cleverly constructed take on the old concept of the evil twin, a soap opera staple that dates back more than a thousand years through movies, books, and poetry.

It's an oxymoron: a show about identity theft with no personality.

If the story-through-backstory becomes more compelling, and in the process Bridget and Siobhan become well-enough developed to give Gellar something to do, Ringer might turn around. So far, though, it's just twice as much of a disappointing thing.

The first episode opens and closes on the cliffhanger of Bridget-as-Siobhan being stalked by an unseen menace, but which sister is the actual target? As long as Ringer keeps us asking questions like this, and Gellar keeps us engaged in the deluxe and twisted sister act, we're more than happy to be put through the romantic-suspense wringer.

The pilot was extremely plot-heavy, so we've got our fingers crossed that future episodes will tone down the action and dig deeper into the characters.

Ringer at times straddles camp--Bridget stays briefly in the "Double Nickel Motel," a wink that the two women truly are flip sides of the same scarred coin --but never succumbs to it, thanks to Gellar's muted performances.

If you can suspend your disbelief enough to get over the improbable premise (and overlook Nestor Carbonell's abuse of eyeliner as FBI agent Victor Machado), Ringer takes you on an exciting, suspenseful ride full of more twists and turns than Siobhan's hallmark hairdo.

Sarah Michelle Gellar returns to TV Tuesday night in a show that could be a lot of soapy fun, but may require more work than some TV viewers will want to put in.

It's inert, lackluster and a trifle old-fashioned. Even the action scenes feel geriatric. It's also vaguely silly--a big reason the venerable good twin/evil twin gambit is better suited to comedy than drama.

Ringer is at times cleverly handled, suggesting numerous plot avenues for the future. Unfortunately, Gellar's wooden performance in the premiere episode doesn't bode well.

OK, so I'm having a real problem with the idea that Bridget could get away with this switch for even one second. If you can look past that, you'll still have to deal with a story so dense it takes a couple long expositional scenes to explain it all.

Barring a significant step up in quality--or at least the self-awareness to stop taking its silly plot and characters so seriously--those people [Gen X'ers who loved "Buffy"] will only be watching out of loyalty to a part that Gellar played a long time ago, on two different networks that no longer exist, and not because she's presently doing work that merits that kind of devotion.

The show is great fun, and clearly the star herself is having fun in the lead roles.

Though handsomely assembled from the spare parts of a dozen other evil-twin stories that came before it, Ringer quickly downgrades itself to a fairly ho-hum night soap.

Tuesday's premiere certainly has enough intrigue for starters. What it needs is more overall electricity.

Two Sarah Michelle Gellars may not be better than one, but they're certainly just as good. And thankfully, that's more than good enough to get the new TV season off to a roaring early start.

The lousy effects that put the twins in the same room are sloppy, and the story line--ripped from a cheesy daytime soap--is worse.

Ringer isn't terrible. But it's less than it could be, and it has yet to present viewers with compelling reasons for putting up with its contrivances.

Twists begin to pile up like they're falling out of a How To Write Noir handbook. And that may be the show's biggest problem: It feels contrived, which makes the audience feel manipulated.

Ringer may not be able to match the Master of Suspense at the top of his game, but it does a great job of creating a constant state of queasy tension.

The downside to Ringer is that unless you're weaned on The CW's fare, it really doesn't have a lot of weight, and Gellar seems stretched a bit thin playing dual roles.

Ringer is nearly all melodramatics, but the pilot has a throwback, B-movie vibe that's entertaining--empty calories, but with a little kick.

Adopting a kitchen-sink approach, Ringer dumps out so many bread crumbs at the outset it's hard not to wonder where they might lead.

Ringer, it turns out, is so good that it's CBS' bad.

If Ringer can retain the gloss and suspense of tonight's premiere, this could be a new series worth getting hooked on. [9/16 Sep 2011, p.133]