When a botched U.S. government experiment turns a group of death row inmates into highly infectious vampires, an orphan girl might be the only person able to stop the ensuing crisis.

Fox’s adaptation of Justin Cronin’s ‘The Passage’ trilogy of vampire dystopian future books hits the ground running in its opening 45-minute pilot, with Lost’s Henry Ian Cusick leading an expedition into the Bolivia Highlands. They discover an ancient man in a cage whose longevity is down to the fact that he’s an ancient vampire, who then infects one of the party. Flash forward three years and a global pandemic of Chinese Avian Flu might only be averted if the vampire disease is incubated in a child.

There’s a lot of world-building ground covered in the first act, which then lets things settle down as the main story is established. Mark-Paul (Saved by the Bell) is operative Brad Wolgast, tasked with bringing in Saniiya Sidney’s Amy (American Horror Story: Roanoke), an orphan who’s outside of the system and ripe to be tested on. But he soon realises that he can’t turn her in and goes rogue, leading to a nationwide manhunt.

A pilot episode’s MO is to offer enough of a hook to reel you in for return visits, and there’s certainly enough going on to lure you back. The dynamic between Wolgast and Amy is terrific, even if the former’s tragic back story and willingness to turn very quickly is very convenient, and I particularly look forward to seeing what the cabal of infected prisoners get up to as things inevitably start going downhill for mankind.

Verdict: There’s just the right amount of drama, gore and emotion in this twist on the ‘fugitives on the run’ genre offering. Like The Strain, it’s hokum of the highest degree and might just end up being your next guilty pleasure. 7/10

Nick Joy

Two scientists discover something impossible, and alive, in the Bolivian jungle. Three years later, one of them is the head of Project NOAH, an attempt to cure all disease. The other is its patient and, maybe, the solution to all its problems. Until a federal agent ordered to bring in the latest NOAH test subject has a crisis of conscience. Together, they go on the run as slowly but surely the world begins to end…

Like all pilots, the first 15 to 20 minutes of this are hard work. We’re introduced to the entire cast, the central ideas that:

An apocalyptic viral outbreak is imminent.

NOAH have a vampire cohort in the basement

All is far from well in the NOAH facility

Brad Wolgast is not at ease

Amy Bellafonte is going to live. No one else may be as lucky.

It’s all dizzying, pretty much all of it plays as flat, hurried and emotionless and at least two characters are very badly served. Richard Piazza’s Clark Richards registers as nothing more than an intense coat with a goatee while Caroline Chikezie’s Doctor Major Nichole Sykes isn’t even named, at least directly. Worse still, we get at least three weird moments too many there. The intent is to show the creatures have already overrun then minds of the staff of NOAH. The reality is it looks like padding the episode for time.

But then, about 20 minutes in, they stop at a fair and Wolgast makes a choice. He chokes his partner out and goes on the run. and what follows is orders of magnitude better than what preceded it. A massive amount of that is down to Mark-Paul Gosselaar as Wolgast. He’s got the same kind of principled, careful sadness that John Bernthal brings to the role of Frank Castle but there’s more inner calm to Wolgast. Or rather, there is once he meets Amy Bellafonte, played by Saniyya Sidney. They have wounds in common and Sidney, who is a newcomer and amazingly good already, fits into Gosselaar’s rhythm perfectly. His Wolgast is serious, even stern. Her Amy is driven, determined and good natured. Two people on the run, not two tropes and that makes all the difference. Every interaction they have is sweet or clever or both, and the show never slows down from that injection of momentum.

Better still, it and Wolgast start making smart choices at the same time. The moment he surrenders is genuinely surprising but makes a ton of sense. The slightly weird comedy of him basically advising the sheriff on how to arrest him is endearing and offbeat. His realisation that NOAH don’t want him in they want him dead is a welcome escalation and cleverly brings the episode full circle and establishes the nature of the show. It’s smart writing and smarter acting.

Unfortunately not all the writing here is as clever. The disproportionate amount of people of colour in America’s prisons makes the presence of one black ‘test subject’ and Amy present as hopelessly naive in a profoundly weird way. Likewise the episode is so concerned with telling us the creatures are infecting people’s dreams that it never bothers asking what they’re doing to stop the alarm being raised. In a pilot, that’s understandable. Outside it, well. Do you want Lost season 1’s ludicrous ‘What polar bear?’ moment? Because that’s how you get Lost season 1’s ludicrous ‘What polar bear?’ moment.

Verdict: The Passage has a near impossible task to do adapting the vast and beloved book. it doesn’t manage everything here but it’s the best start anyone could hope for and, if they stick to the courage of the plot’s convictions, this season is going to go somewhere extraordinary. Right now, it’s looking like it’s worth the ride. 8/10

Alasdair Stuart