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I find this series highly watchable. A great and unique premise plays out in each episode while main character Detective Britten solves two crimes with interesting crossover pieces. Suddenly there's a singular crime this time around to good effect. This one, however, is almost spoiled (not quite) by a terrible character. The FBI agent sent in to help is flat and totally, due to personal bias and motives, unbelievable. This character is both written and played terribly. Of course, Britten will prevail mostly, not completely, in spite of this. I'd say a better episode easily could have been written around the same basic story. There's a difference worth noting here and that is between the consecutive days (realities) for the first time we barely see Britten's wife, or son. Also, this episode skews almost completely to one of the two days instead of a 50/50 balance between the two. The dwelling on one day, and that crime, is a good move I'd say rearranging the basic formula of the show keeping interest up.

Here's a shocker: men make bad choices when their judgement is clouded by a pretty face. Though I'm being sarcastic, such has been the downfall of empires...as well as fodder for many films. Pitfall goes distinctly in this direction. Fortunately that direction is well done.

Dick Powell, as insurance recovery man John Forbes, is the picture of professional and personal stability. A family man with a loving wife and fine young son. He should be enjoying the good life. However, he's not exactly a contented soul as we immediately see. He's feeling very constrained by the repetition of the mundane regularity he finds all around him. That veneer of stability is suddenly in question as he investigates a recovery case which involves a young attractive blonde Mona Stevens, played by Lisbeth Scott. Finding himself attracted to Stevens is bad enough, yet there's more. That would be the private investigator he often uses to get the leads needed for recovery. A sort of hulk of a Frankenstein , P. I. MacDonald, played with ice by Raymond Burr, has eyes on Stevens to which he takes offense when he realizes John Forbes does too.

The complications above make for a pretty compelling watch as they further unfold. There's a palpable horror hovering keeping things on edge. This is something one can imagine could actually all happen. The question in the end might be if a woman can be a man's downfall, can she be his redemption?

Re-watching Awake ten years on it's a police show unlike any other. That may be an understatement as it probably isn't a police show as much as a psychological drama. A show that explores two parallel realities being lived out with a major difference between the two. Each singular reality plays on consecutive days. Only there are some wicked common threads that blur that separation. Both realities deal with a devastating loss of a loved one in a family of three. Each day detective Michael Britton has to deal with either the loss of his wife , or son, while solving seemingly separate crimes. That means on one day, along with his wife, he deals with their loss of their son. The next day he's a widower raising his son alone. On these consecutive days he is assigned to very different crimes which seem to have something in common to both key to closing them. He isn't sure which, if either, is the true reality as each day that one seems to be the "real" one. Of course he'd rather not live a reality with either so in this odd way he still has his family intact...just not simultaneously. He also must decode the one thing common to these separate day's crimes. Wow, this sure isn't lazy writing. It's refreshingly creative even as there's a cloud hovering in Britton's dilemma.

This is a radical idea for a show that is neither sci-fi or paranormal. I have to imagine it is quite polarizing for viewers in which some will turn away while others dig in. I would urge you to begin, and hang on for, say, three episodes for your trial. It gets hypnotically complex, thus much more interesting - dare I say compelling given a fair chance. Awake is unlike anything else on TV I can recall, all for the better.

The second time around I'm convinced this might be the finest one-season drama I have seen on TV. I would even go as far as to say this is one that is perfect in being a one and done season as I believe the similarities of How each episode plays out could be watered down through more repetition. The supporting cast is more than serviceable, but it's Jason Issac's portrayal of Michael Britton that makes this that one-season perfectly realized idea for a very unique show.