NBC's brand-new TV series, Debris, needs to fix the inherent problem it has, one shared by many modern sci-fi series, if it wants to succeed. Debuting on Monday, March 1, the show is being touted as "the next X-Files" and the framework of it certainly makes it appear so. CIA agent Bryan Beneventi (Jonathan Tucker) and MI6 agent Finola Jones (Riann Steele) are paired together to explore reports of mysterious alien debris that has crashed all around the U.S., the debris possessing mysterious properties and extremely dangerous powers. Like The X-Files odd-couple pairing of eccentric believer Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and skeptical medical doctor Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson), Debris clearly wants to recapture their magic with the pairing of Beneventi and Jones.
The problem is that Beneventi and Jones aren't Mulder and Scully - yet. The magic of the X-Files pilot was that audiences knew exactly who Mulder and Scully were and why they should care about them by the end of the pilot, if not immediately. Mulder's passion for the job was embedded in him at a young age due to the traumatic experience of witnessing his sister's alien abduction; Scully, despite not being a believer, as in no way over her head, both sharp, discerning, and the perfect foil for Mulder's sometimes out-there conspiracy theories. Unfortunately, that feeling of wanting to root for the characters was mostly missing in the Debris pilot.
The problem is that Debris built its pilot around the same fundamental flaw that a number of modern-day sci-fi mystery series have: mystery boxing for the sake of mystery boxing and nothing more. It was J.J. Abrams' Lost that kickstarted the modern trend as we know it today in 2004. Lost was famous for introducing Abrams' concept of the "mystery box," in which audiences are dropped into the middle of a complex mystery that leaves them wanting to figure it out. But Lost, like The X-Files (and even, one could argue, Twin Peaks before it), crucially made sure to tie their characters to the mystery itself and to quickly get the audience on board with characters. Post-Lost, however, so many mystery sci-fi shows have failed to understand why Lost's mystery boxing and the X-Files's weird sci-fi worked: they used the mystery in service of the story, not the other way around. If Debris wants to truly be the next X-Files, it needs to flip that order around fast.
Granted, it's hard to judge a show after only one episode, particularly network dramas, which are often known for churning out pilots without engines. But right now, Debris falls too much into the all-too-common modern sci-fi mystery trap of treating mystery and story as the same thing. Simply put, they're missing their "story engine," or the driving force behind it all, specifically, the thing that keeps propelling the characters forward. The X-Files' engine is Mulder's relentless drive to learn if aliens exist in order to figure out what happened to his sister all those years ago and the will they/won't they dynamic established in the pilot. Personal stakes are established early: For Mulder, it's rooted in childhood trauma. For Scully, her X-Files engine is rooted in her near-religious faith in science. Who they are is immediately apparent.
Right now, it's tough to say what drives Debris' characters, what its story engine is. Beneventi's reason for investigating the alien debris is simply that he didn't know what else to do once he got out of the military. Jones' reason for it is slightly purer in that she believes the debris could be used to help mankind. Beneventi has a mysterious past trauma that has shaped him, however, and Jones may or may not be a double agent. It makes it unclear to get a handle on who the characters are. If Debris wants to capture an audience the way The X-Files did, it has to choose one or the other: either it mystery boxes the story or it mystery boxes the characters; it just can't do both and expect the audience to care.