The Listener DVD Review




Title: The Listener
Starring: Craig Olejnik, Enis Esmer, Colm Feore, Lisa Marcos
Released: 13th September 2010
Cert: 15
Discs: 4 discs
RRP: £19.99

In this set there are the full 13 episodes from the first season each with a running time of 40 minutes a piece.

The Listener is a supernatural drama, created by Michael Amo. It’s a Canadian TV show about Toby Logan, (Craig Olejnik), a Toronto paramedic with a dark secret and a mysterious past. What other people don’t know is that he can hear their thoughts. He’s an EMT with ESP! He’s kept his secret all his life. He never knew his father and he wasn’t close to his mother. He was raised in foster homes.

His therapist (Colm Feore) is one of the only people that knows his secret, even his best pal and paramedic partner, Oz (Enis Esmer) and his girlfriend Detective Charlie Marks (Lisa Marcos) don’t know about his gift. But now the feelings are getting stronger and his power is increasing. Toby knows he can use his gift for good, especially considering his job as a paramedic. He often has the jump on something that is about to happen and because of this he can react faster and more efficiently to save lives.

There are similarities with the recently released Royal Pains, although that is more of a comedy, The Listener is sort of like watching one of the investigators from the CSI series, only this is an investigator that also has ESP.

The series takes on a fairly well-worn pattern of inter-cutting between Toby’s day-to-day business, the weekly bad guy that must be brought to justice, and the weekly victim that Toby has to help. It also has regular small parts of the larger story arc woven into the weekly stories, to allow the viewer to uncover snippets of information about Toby’s past and how he has lived his life with his gift. In the pilot episode Toby saves a woman from a car wreck and then tracks down her son who has been kidnapped by a bent cop who has killed his partner and is trying to cover it up.

There are moments of suspense from episode to episode although of course we always know that Toby is going to catch the bad guy and everything will be alright in the end. It’s not the sort of show where things are going to go bad. It treads a fairly safe line. However there is an element of excitement when Toby begins to rediscover his past – through, often painful, flashbacks.

The Listener is already an International TV Hit and after a successful run on the FX channel it has become popular with UK viewers. Personally, although everyone involved is clearly doing a good job of acting or directing, I found it a little bland at times, meaning that for me this show never really got past, mildly diverting. For me, it’s not exactly must-see TV. That said I’m sure it will find an eager and faithful following of viewers as it will no doubt appeal to anyone interested in telepathy or ESP and as I said it’s well produced and looks good on DVD.

Author : Kevin Stanley