Alcatraz Preview from Stars Jorge Garcia and Sarah Jones, Plus Executive Producer Jack Bender
Alcatraz, J.J. Abrams’ newest television venture, deals with yet another mysterious island. But this time around, there is only one major secret: In 1963, 256 prisoners and 46 guards literally vanished into thin air. The act was covered up, and history moved on, but now those men are returning—and they are even more dangerous in the modern day. The show is one part procedural and one part mythology program. Snakkle highlights the Top 5 qualities that will grant Alcatraz a captive audience. By Danielle Turchiano5. Fans of Abrams’ most recent TV hit, Lost, may feel themselves getting déjà vu, not only because of references of “going back to the island,” but also in Jorge Garcia’s character in general. Diego “Doc” Soto is a comic-book writer and shop owner who has a deep love and knowledge for all things “The Rock” and finds himself living his own wet dream when he is brought in to partner with Detective Rebecca Madsen on the strange and secretive manhunts.
“He’s kind a fish out of water, for sure,” Garcia previewed. “He finds himself in situations where there are people dropping around him, and he’s kind of like, ‘That could have been me.’”
4. There’s a heroine who’s a bit of an amalgamation of the strong female detectives who have come before her, from Olivia Benson to Olivia Dunham, but whose mind is open to the possibilities in front of her. Sarah Jones portrays Detective Rebecca Madsen, a young woman who has a personal family history with the island—a history that is revealed in the pilot to be much deeper and darker a connection than she was ever told.
According to Jones, “After the pilot, almost everything she might have thought were her conflicts go out the window, and it really turns into ‘What the hell am I doing here? What the hell is going on?’ And I think for her, if anything, her conflict is to find her grounding again.”
3. Even the main players are not who they appear to be. Sam Neill’s Emerson Hauser may be leading the team to recapture these “worst of the worst” criminals, but he knows more about the “where” and the “why” than he will share with Madsen and Doc. This promises some strong internal team conflict sure to further complicate each week’s mission. Dare we say Hauser is the next Ben Linus?
2. Though the pilot episode sets up a lot of questions—namely where these people have been for almost four full decades, what is their purpose in coming back now, and how have they been so drastically changed—the show promises to answer them sooner rather than later, especially as they pertain to the protagonists.
“Part of each episode is that you get a little bit closer to finding out why these guys are here, where are they coming from, who’s running it,” Jones spilled. “They’re not making the audience wait forever and ever to figure things out; they’re giving people a glimpse into what’s going on. And so very soon you will see why her grandfather went there and how that affects [Rebecca].”
1. Alcatraz will draw on some real criminals and issues of the time and mix them with fictional elements from the writers’ minds to create scary and unique “goon of the week” players. Series executive producer Jack Bender shared that at the end of the first season, every fan “should have their favorite killer—as if they were on baseball cards!” One of the most powerful ways the show will play with this concept? Bender previewed an episode about the segregated block—in 1963 black prisoners and white prisoners were not allowed to mingle, eat together, or share walls—as well as fictionalized versions of “Birdman” and George “Machine Gun” Kelly.
Alcatraz premieres on Fox on January 16 with a special two-hour episode.