User Reviews

Chicago has been decimated. People live day to day and have forgotten a past when things were routinely taken for granted. An old man, played by Harold Gould, takes it upon himself to continue to remind people of what there once was. He becomes an enemy of the state. I suppose it poses a threat to the powers that be if people can continue to feel a sense of their past. Those who hope to change the world are submerged in poverty, but they hold meetings to talk about what once was. The old man who is rife with stories becomes a treasure to them. The hope is he will pass on this information to enough people to make a difference. This is a really interesting offering.

He was ahead of his time. This episode is relevant even today. As the cancel culture erases the past will we see a police state where they go around stopping anyone taking or publishing history that they deem wrong? A good episode. Listen closely

"I don't remember poetry. I only remember the flotsam and jetsam of the last civilization to run over the cliff, and which still has not hit bottom."

Ray Bradbury at his finest.

Prior to his death Bradbury was walking past his local library, and saw bound volumes of the Complete Works of Cicero stacked up on the sidewalk to be picked up and hauled away by the garbage truck. He went in and asked the librarian why, and she told him it was to make more room for books on the occult and VHS tapes. With today's librarians who needs firemen.

Still falling. Not hit bottom yet.

But "To the Chicago Abyss" earns it from me. Primarily because it lives up to the title of the show. It's Ray Bradbury through and through. Not every episode of the series lived up to the prose of Bradbury. Some just weren't suited to TV, some were too interested in trying to overcome the limitation of the practically non-existence budget, and some of Bradbury's short stories just didn't make much sense. At least to me: your mileage may vary.

But when Bradbury was clicking on all cylinders, he clicks. There are other episodes, like "The Pedestrian", where you're listening to Bradbury's poetry. "Abyss" is another. I've never been substantially impressed with Harold Gould, but he hits it out of the park here which is basically him standing there and telling a bunch of people why he remembers and fights for the mediocre. The "Old Man" (I could see Darren McGavin in the role: shades of "A Christmas Story") is no one special: he's just an old man who has a gift for remembering the past. As even he admits, neither he nor what he remembers is anything special. But that's how you take down the rich, the powerful, the "experts".

In 'Leverage", the team take down the rich and powerful. But a) they're super-talented, and b) they're confrontational. The Old Man in "Abyss" is neither. He's just a nobody, but he can inspire because the past speaks through him. He doesn't confront the rich and powerful, or their representatives: he runs rather than fights. All he does is speak for the past. But oh does he speak.

The episode falls entirely on Gould's shoulders. Neil Munro is good, as he is in pretty much everything he is. I like his near-tearful telling the Old Man that he can't remember, and that's why he took the Old Man in. But that's pretty much small change. It all comes down to Gould, and his "Old Man". The episode couldn't function without him, and it's a credit to Gould that it does.

But to quote from "A Sound of Thunder", oh, how do I do go on. Watch the episode yourself if you can, and see what I mean,.

But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong. Watch it, and tell us what you think.