Jarod's "space"

[pretender_gurl]

Okay, this has bothered me for a long time. In the pilot episode, Miss Parker visits Jarod's "space" and it's a nice room! I mean it's got carpeting and plush furniture and good lighting. Even the hallways of the Centre seem brighter in the first few episodes!

Then it's like the writers suddenly decide to portray the Centre as a darker place and everything changes. Now Jarod remembers living in a cell -- like in Dragon House when they show the rooms that Kyle and Jarod stayed in.

Finally, in Pretender 2001, they show the pretenders in a true prison cell atmosphere.

What am I missing here? Was he in a nice room like the pilot episode, or a hole with strobing lights and leaking pipes as in "the World is Changing"

[twin2of3]

I just chalk it up to the producers changed their minds! Having that great space, wouldn't really move Jarod to run away...I mean...like you said, it was a great room! But, having the Centre as a prison really gives Jarod another reason to leave. Plus, it makes the Centre more evil!

~Twin2of3

[JayVitolo]

Its the same with the dates on the DSA videos. It just adds another air of mystery to the place.

Reminds me of the constant changes of Miss Parker...she starts off as a pregnant dog in the Pilot, but then by the end you see sh'es in love with the man she is chasing.

[Danielle]

I just chalk it up to the producers changed their minds!

samer here

[Ruby Trinity]

It's hard for me to think of the creators of tP as human and therefore with human flaws, like changing their mind etc. so I was thinking about all this. And in my little universe I've come up with some other ideas (other than Craig and Steven didn't know what they were doing!!!).

Maybe it was all for Parker's benefit? She wouldn't mind bringing back Jarod if it was to the plush room she saw, I don't remember the first ep (haven't seen it since it first aired in 96) so my theory might have all sorts of flaws but I'm going to voice them anyway.

Maybe the cell he was in in tP 2001 was because of he's increasing restlessness, I remember one ep that discussed why he escaped and that they tempted him to do a SIM with the promise of being let free. Maybe they thought he would try to escape and therefore had him under tighter security than usual.

Maybe he was given perks if he behaved. Chucked in a dark cell if he refused to do a SIM or disobeyed them in some way and was returned to the room we saw in the pilot ep if he behaved.

Maybe the creators wanted us to see the Centre as everyone else does in the begining, as some rich place with all the trappings of an established and profitable organisation. And then over time we see it as what it really is, what's hidden behind all those bright lights; dark, dim corridors with secrets and horrors behind every corner.

ok that about does it for the imaginative sidestepping of reality... oh but I can be incredibly stubborn and I like it this way so much better coz then it has meaning.

[pretender_gurl]

Okay, I'm back to the pilot with my tapes, and this room thing is still bugging me. Like Anna, I don't like the idea that the crew just messed up.

However, in tP 2001 there is a flashback of Jarod sitting at a table in (what we eventually call) a normally dank Centre room in front of a big screen that is showing the same plane crash as the screen in the furnished room from the pilot. Jarod hands a Sweeper a disk containing his final reccomendations for the simulation and it looks like this is where he's been working on the sim (there are maps on the table). But in the pilot, Syd shows MP the same sim, making it look like Jarod was doing the sim there.

And we don't see any cameras in the nice room.

Then we're brought to the Tech Room where MP finds out that Jarod scrambled the ATM system. Yeah, not the same Tech Room as we see later with Broots.

And what is up with that homeless guy holding up the sign that says "Hi Guys" and then Miss Parker says "Hello Jarod" and it isn't even Jarod! It would have been so much better if it actually had been Jarod being a smartass.

I've come to the conclusion that the pilot is a really disappointing episode compared to the rest of the series. Everything that we see in it is eventually contradicted. Did they get a new writing staff after the first episode or something?

They could have just cut the first episode from the series and started with "Every Pic..."

Emily

[JayVitolo]

A Pilot episode is made to get a network to pick up a certain show...once the show has been given a network home, the writers are able to persue a more creative approach. That is a good reason why everything was pretty much killed off from the Pilot.

[Debbie]

The pilot was filmed in Canada, like the two TNT movies. I read somewhere that MTW was surprised NBC bought the series and it lasted 4 seasons.