REVIEW: PEACEKEEPERS – Saving The World One Text At A Time

Imagine, just for a moment, that you could be given a mission to save the world. You could just quit your job, whatever you were doing and work for an employer that gave you missions to save the lives of people every day. Sounds pretty epic, right?

PEACEKEEPERS is a new, dark comedy that follows a young woman named Alana as she struggles to balance a normal life while being called to save many lives during the day. The series is written and directed by Charlie Reeves and produced by Shelley Patel and Sam Day. It is an official selection of the Independent Television Festival.

We’re met with beautiful portraits of New York City at the start which is soon accompanied by the sound of a text message alert. Immediately, I’m reminded of Sherlock. Sherlock used a unique way of showing text messages to viewers. The actual message was superimposed on the screen instead of doing a closeup on the phone itself. It’s exciting to see that more and more shows are following this method. We quickly see all of the different text messages that pedestrians are receiving which is a good way to establish that this medium of communication is important to the series.

This leads us to meet our main character, Alana (Maria Makenna) who is traveling on the subway chatting on her phone when a frustrated man can’t get service on his phone. She is following orders by someone on the other end and is given 10 minutes to get to her destination. Cue the title screen, PEACEKEEPERS, over black. We’re back to following Alana as she has 27 seconds left to get to her destination as she spots her target. An unusual method of illustrating action randomly pops up. We now see the situation as if it were an old school video game. This was an odd choice. There wasn’t any motivation for it and it didn’t do much except show the viewers she was closing the distance. The target trips, drops some stuff and blocks traffic. Alana comes to the rescue, lets traffic continue and walks off proudly knowing that she just successfully completed her mission.

Next, we come up on two people sitting in a bar. We see Alana having a drink with her co-worker, Sophie (Madeline Wise). They are discussing normal life and how it is working for this one man known as The Peacekeeper. Sophie had just completed a mission preventing someone from committing suicide. As Sophie goes to retrieve more drinks, a sketchy man brings a bag into the bar and leaves. I mean, that’s pretty sketchy. What’s in the bag?

There’s some great comic moments in this series too. A good deal of it would be the fact that Alana is trying to live a normal life while managing this unique job that she holds. She attempts to go on a date with a man named Michael (Jacques Mitchell). We get a nice montage between the two on their date along with some witty banter. Of course, she gets a lot of interruptions from her phone. Michael is understanding of it and actually knows about her job. Would that be a deal breaker in the relationship? It’s cool. Alana is really this superhero. He’s got to be attached to her. I mean, the man waited for her even though she was 40 minutes late to their date! Anyone with some common sense would’ve been like “Uh..well, see ya!”

Eventually, they are forced to part ways when Alana is called to save a man choking on a hotdog. She boards the subway en route to her destination. A sketchy man once again throws a bag onto the subway. Based off the reactions from the other people on the subway, it looks like a bomb. If a bag beeps like that, it’s probably a bomb. We cut immediately to Alana leaving the subway and she is out of time. As soon as she reaches the top of the stairs, she sees medical personnel gathered around someone lying on the ground. We can assume that the man she was supposed to save died.

From there, we’re pulled into a flashback to 10 years ago. We see Alana attempting to talk a man out of jumping from a really high position in a building. We quickly learn that this man is her father. This was a nice way of showing us how Alana chose to work for The Peacekeeper. I mean, it’s cool to have a job like that, but everyone has a reason for doing something. We also learn that this was a dream interrupted by, once again, her work phone. Alana is really running up her cell phone minutes with this organization. Hey, if they are paying the bill, call her all you want.

At the end, we see Alana confront the bartender about the strange bag thrown onto the subway and how it was a bomb. He assures her it wouldn’t go off. He admits that it was only there to interrupt her mission and to prevent her from succeeding.

Uh, what? Alana storms out of the bar as the bartender begins to text someone. We cut to the person on the other end to only be surprised with a plot twist. Bum bum bum! It’s Michael! Audible gasp! Alana should’ve done a background check on that guy. He lied on his OkCupid profile!

The performances in this show were strong. Maria Makenna delivered a solid performance as Alana. The relationship that she had with Jacques Mitchell as Michael was great. They had a good chemistry about them especially on their date. The way they communicated when they met in the restaurant was fun to watch. It was like a tennis match. As a whole, the cast did a great job at bringing the viewers into this world. It was believable.

Everything in this series involving production was done really well. All of the components came together as a whole and were strong. I was engrossed in the story being told which is a great thing. The sound (Jacopo Messina) was clear and crisp all the way. The only thing that stood out to me was the extremely loud sound after Alana sees the man she failed to save. It starts off very subtle, but increases in volume to the point where it’s extremely overwhelming. This was likely intentional, but it didn’t seem necessary to push the story along. The hair/makeup (Ashley Maybruck) and costume design (Samantha Seda) all fit the world this story is set in. It also fit the tone of the show. The show has dark themes and the way the characters were represented fit that.

I thought that the cinematography (Hilarion Banks) was beautiful. It was very clear. The shots done in the bar and the shots at night when Michael and Alana are on their date were especially my favorite. The lighting in those shots came across as soft and natural. It can be hard to accomplish good, natural lighting in a scene that takes place at night.

PEACEKEEPERS has a very unique type of story to tell. It’s a dark comedy that opens up this mysterious world where modern technology aids employed citizens resembling vigilantes in a way. Normal people can save the world one person at a time? Sign me up! If you’re interested in shows like Sherlock, I recommend this series for you.

For more information about the show, please check out the links below:

OFFICIAL WEBSITE: https://peacekeepersnyc.squarespace.com

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/peacekeepersnyc

TWITTER: https://twitter.com/peacekeepersnyc