Anna Pigeon’s Series Premiere Burns Through Plots Faster Than a Wildfire

Critic’s Rating: 3.9 / 5.0

3.9

Anna Pigeon gets off to an ambitious start.

I say that in the sense that, as a pilot, it attempts to establish this primary character and her world, and sows the seeds for her background and potential plots.

And with the exposition and the fact that the series premiere drops us in the middle of said world and via exposition and so forth, begs us to keep up, Anna Pigeon Season 1 Episode 1 feels like it burns through a lot of plot in a short period of time.

We waste no time at all diving into our plucky, jaded, and pretty badass lead’s world at the most recent of many national parks she’s working at as she dives headfirst into a murder investigation.

It’s a fun role for Tracy Spiridakos because it’s not unlike previous ones she’s had with Anna, having an endearing, complex, and fierce quality to her that she exuded during Chicago PD and Revolution.

Anna feels very grounded as a character, with a wit to her that made me chuckle a few times, and it’s evident she has a knack for finding trouble, or rather for trouble inevitably finding her.

It’s the mark of a solid crime series, though, right?

Anna Pigeon truly catapults us right into the thick of it.

Within the first five minutes or so, we’re already dealing with the murder of a fellow park ranger, Sheila, and Anna pushing back against her colleagues who want to write it off as a cougar killing her.

It’s clearly an arc that’s pulled from the Nevada Barr novel “Track the Cat,” hence the name of the episode. And, as a case, it has a lot going for it, which is why I can understand why it’s a worthwhile one to explore.

Where things go awry, however, is that we haven’t fully grasped these characters, including Anna, enough to face down a case that involves the murder of one of their own by another one of their own.

I did spend half the hour thinking that her boss and the murderer were one and the same.

We never got to know Sheila, so her death doesn’t have much impact on us. We barely know Anna, let alone any of the other supporting characters, for a case like this.

And revelations like discovering that Sheila was dating the single mother in town just kind of hang there with no real impact because we’re not only outsiders but newcomers in this world.

The death of a fellow park ranger could’ve been interesting as a case if it expanded a bit longer into the season while Anna helped to solve other cases.

Or it would’ve worked great as a case for the second or third episode.

At best, it establishes two things that make it useful: it helps Anna — who we’re told is a notorious drifter who relocates often and doesn’t stay in any park too long — choose to stay at this place a bit longer.

It also introduces us to the season’s antagonist, Jeremiah.

He’s partially to blame for Sheila’s death because he’s the wealthy developer and power player in town who feels he runs everything.

His desire to hunt and poach wildcats, which Sheila discovered, is what prompted the other ranger working for Jeremiah to kill her in the first place.

Jeremiah seems like a piece of work, and he has the making of a worthwhile antagonist for Anna. Their interactions were already charged, and it’s clear she’s about to be a thorn in his side.

The case also leads to Anna adopting Sheila’s cat, and that part was cute. Nothing shows that she’s willing to set down roots and let people in, like taking on an animal that may be just as prickly as she is.

The hour also gives us a crash course in that, too.

Through some at times rough expository dialogue (Molly’s mouthful informing us that she’s an esteemed professional psychiatrist in the city was especially egregious), we learn that Anna has had a rough few years.

She went from a city slicker person who worked in the art world and had a husband, to a widow who has become a park ranger who occasionally solves crime.

Echoing Reacher‘s Alan Ritchson’s recent sentiment about the absence of normal, everyday people being action stars in movies — it’s actually nice to know that she doesn’t have some extensive past in law enforcement, some elaborate military background, or anything else.

She’s just an art lady!

We know that she lost her husband, and there’s clearly more to that since her relationship with the charming and endearing Stanton is a result of his investigation into her husband’s death.

She’s still grieving, and it’s a cause for concern for Molly, whom she at least still chats with regularly enough to assuage her sister’s worries.

When Anna gets cat-trapped and winds up dangling from a cliff, it’s her late husband whom she envisages helping her, guiding her, encouraging her to fight and save herself.

There’s a lot of unsettled emotions there, and the season’s overarching mystery may very well be what relates to how her husband died.

In the interim, she does find some physical companionship with bartender Jesse. He’s… nice. And, hey, he’s nice to look at.

But go figure, the character Anna seems to have the most instant chemistry with for me is Stanton. When she calls, he comes. That’s always my type of dynamic.

The intimacy and familiarity between them feels very lived in without it seeming like we’re missing or excluded from something.

Not only did Stanton have a kickass entrance, but he genuinely seems like the one person who can match Anna’s energy, and whom she’s willing to let in. And I love that.

It’ll be the dynamic I’m most invested in — I can already tell.

The premiere comes in hot and burns through things fast — it results in a case that doesn’t have as much breathing room as it deserves.

But I’m happy to drop into the world of Anna Pigeon, see what other cases she happens across, and stick around for a while. How about you?

Campfire Confessions:

• Anna is a better person than I am because I was actively rooting for the cougar to maul the dirty park ranger. I mean, if he could kill Sheila and set up an innocent cougar for it, then the laws of the jungle dictate that beautiful kitty could get her lick, or scratch, or bite back.
• Zoey Bear seems really sweet, and I look forward to seeing more of Annie mentoring her.
• I loved the framing and how the scene of Anna stripping down and getting into that tub, all battered and bruised, was shot.
• Shoutout to the iconic Lea Thompson for that. It just felt so real, not weird, or exploitative, or oddly sexual, just real. I, too, sit on the edge of a tub and sigh before I collect myself enough to soak my weary bones.

• We had the pleasure of speaking with creator and showrunner Morwyn Brebner about the series, and one of the things we spoke about is how the setting feels like its own character. It’s so scenic and gorgeous, and I love that we have so many shots outside, in the elements, the mountains in the distance. It’s beautiful.
• I’m curious to see more of Anna’s past with her husband and how she migrated to this as a career path.

Over to you, Anna Pigeon Fanatics. Did you love the debut of this series? How do you feel about Anna? Let’s discuss it all below!