Sex, violence and no credibility in ‘StartUp’
There are three very steamy sex scenes in the first 14 minutes of Crackle’s new series, “StartUp.” Some readers may respond to that news with a simple, “’Nuff said.”
But for the rest of you, “StartUp” has other ways of keeping your attention, even if many of them not only defy credibility, but also blow it to smithereens.
The 10-episode series, premiering next Tuesday, Sept. 6, focuses on three people from radically different backgrounds who team up to make a killing with a new virtual currency called GenCoin, and a rather diabolical FBI agent who’s out to get them for some shady dealings.
Nick Talman (Adam Brody) is the squeaky-clean son of a ma-
jor con artist named Andy Talman (Carl Weintraub), who is on the run after trying to cheat members of a Haitian gang in Miami.
Nick wants nothing to do with his father’s business, but then dear old Dad gives him a flash drive with access to all the missing money and goes on the lam. Instead of just throwing up his hands, Nick accepts the flash drive and then, on a whim, decides to invest it as seed funding with a young Cuban American tech whiz named Isabelle “Izzy” Morales (Otmara Marrero), who believes that GenCoin can do what other attempts at virtual currency, including bitcoin, have not: remain above making it easier to launder money and evade paying taxes.
Meanwhile, as they used to say in TV melodramas, Ronald Dacey (Edi Gathegi) is involved in illicit activities and in the midst of a gang war. At home, he’s “father knows best” — a loving, attentive husband and father. Once he leaves the house, he’s ruthless.
And then there’s Agent Phil Rask (Martin Freeman), a real cool customer who starts out trying to track down Andy Talman and soon reveals himself to have the ethics of a sewer rat. As Nick and Izzy shift Andy’s money around in order to keep their heads attached to their bodies, Rask is tracing their every step.
The first episode is especially overstuffed with plot possibilities, and subsequent episodes are only marginally more linear. At any number of points in the story, your eyes will get a real workout — from rolling.
The story is full of sex and violence, yes, but it’s also a showcase for very solid performances — albeit none that actually make their characters entirely believable.
Freeman, probably best known for his co-starring role as Watson in the PBS “Sherlock” and the cute and cuddly Bilbo Baggins in the “Hobbit” films, shows a whole new side of himself here. He is not a very nice man, and it turns out, no surprise, that Freeman is as good at playing bad as he is at playing good.
Brody and Marrero are equally fine, and Kelvin Harrison Jr. delivers a knockout performance as Ronald’s son Touie, who is in danger of following in his father’s professional footsteps.
The series was created by Ben Katai, who has the right idea, even if it gets smothered beneath unbelievable storytelling: Characters with flexible moral standards on both sides of the law are inspired to doing bad things because of the opportunities digital currency seems to offer.
The show’s sex and violence propel the story, but not quite to the speed necessary to occlude its problems. If you work extra hard to suspend disbelief, it’s modestly entertaining.