On TV: Complications lives up to its name; Life Story by Attenborough
Written by Burn Notice creator Matt Nix, Complications isn't quite sure what it wants to be; David Attenborough covers complications, too - in the lives of birds and animals dicing daily with disaster
As Confucius once said, "Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated."
If your skinnymochafrappucino was a tad too sweet this morning, or your journey to work was made stressful by the guy in the new Audi who had the gall to push in front of you, putting you behind schedule by a nanosecond, well, boo hoo. If we just focused on what's really important - our family, friends and health - life could indeed be relatively simple for most of us. Not that you'd believe it judging by the abundance of first-world problems found on some expat forums ("I forgot my yoga mat today and had to use someone else's!")
If things haven't been going totally your way of late, just remind yourself: there's always someone having a rougher time than you. Take Dr John Ellison, for example; tune in and you'll be glad that it's his life, and not yours, that is filled with Complications (FX, Thursday at 10pm).
Grieving the loss of a young daughter, the doc (Irish actor Jason O'Mara; Terra Nova) works the night shift in a hospital emergency room, as he and his wife struggle to rebuild their shattered relationship. When he witnesses a gangland drive-by shooting, Ellison stops to assist the young victim and, picking up a discarded weapon, shoots one of the gunmen, becoming an unlikely hero. His intervention, though, sets off a chain of events that pushes Ellison ever closer to the edge and forces him to take desperate measures to protect the victim as well as his family. Of course, Ellison conceals all of this gang warfare from his wife (well, you would, wouldn't you!) and turns for help to a wild and, as luck would have it, attractive young nurse.
O'Mara brings intensity to the moody lead role as he quickly becomes comfortable with a gun in his hand and grapples with the notion of hurting people and saving others. Written by Burn Notice creator Matt Nix, the convoluted drama (it has more flashbacks than the Grateful Dead) isn't quite sure what it wants to be and, confusingly, throws everything at the wall, to see what sticks.
It's unclear what significance a dead squirrel played in the good doc's life (another of Complications' unexplained red herrings, perhaps) but it would have felt more in keeping with Life Story, another of David Attenborough's captivating documentary series, this one focusing on the extraordinary tests of survival animals face in order to continue their bloodline.