What works: The idea of having a show about the same day repeating over and over is a bold one, and I'm happy to say "Day Break" lives up to its ambition. The above summary doesn't do it justice - there's literally a half-dozen subplots introduced in the first 20 minutes alone, all or none of which could turn out to be related to his predicament. Plus the concept of him having lived through each "day" is pretty clever, meaning he can't do this ad nauseam and presumably if he dies, he's dead. It's also quite refreshing that the "mysterious figures in every sci-fi TV show/movie" are just as in the dark as he is about the day repeating, making the audience no more ahead of the plot than Hopper himself. As for Diggs, he's your typical tough guy lead - complete with witty comebacks like "you need a breath mint" - and carries the bulk of the show effortlessly. The real thrill of the show however is that you definitely get the sense something bigger is going on as various innocuous seeds are planted - like, why does a bearded man (Clayton Rohner) keep on staring down Hopper each "day?" - and each time you watch, you catch something new.
What doesn't: As one might expect from this type of show, you can smell the fumes from it starting to paint itself into a corner. While the pilot's three "days" are decidedly different, one wonders if by episode 17 seeing the same set of events transpire might get stale. There's also a lot of "wink, wink, did you catch that?" in terms of "random" events repeating - the Dodgers rally to win what appears to be a blowout, a news broadcast mentions a truck full of diapers overturned on the 405, etc. - to that point that hearing them every week could get annoying. Nevertheless, one can't help but have high hopes for this show - TV needs shows like this, whether they crash and burn or not. And the tweaks to the usual "time travel/repeating day" formula certainly gives you the sense you're not going to be disappointed with what's ahead.
The challenges ahead: Already on track to spell "Lost" on Wednesday nights in the winter, will viewers give "Day Break" a shot?
