Los Angeles, 1967. Welcome to the Summer of Love. Aquarius stars David Duchovny as Sam Hodiak, a seasoned homicide detective whose investigations dovetail with the activities of real life cult leader Charles Manson in the years before he masterminded the most notorious killings of a generation, the Tate-LaBianca murders. A small time but charismatic leader with big plans, Manson has begun to build up his "family", recruiting vulnerable young men and women to join his cause. Teaming up with a young cop who will help him infiltrate Manson's circle, Hodiak is forced to see things through the questioning eyes of someone who came of age amongst the current anti-establishment counterculture. Edgy, addictive and visually stunning, the Age of Aquarius is here.
There are some shows that don't really click with you. They can be well filmed, they can be well acted, but you just can't get enthusiastic about them. For me, Aquarius is one of those series.
There were things that started putting me off right away. The cinematography was slick but uninteresting. And I love 60s music, but I'm a little tired of this idea that you have to have people constantly listening to all the coolest songs from the 60s.
I didn't find most of the characters interesting, including Manson. I admit, Manson is tough, in that it's possible he really was kind of uninteresting but good at talking to particularly dumb girls, but to me he seems transparent and that makes his success puzzling.
For me, the only real bright spot was Grey Damon as an undercover cop. His scenes were all good, and I enjoyed the banter between Damon and Duchovny (although the rest of the time I found Duchovny flat).
I think this series is well enough made that there are people who will really like it, but I felt restless within the first 10 minutes and nothing in the rest of the first episode pulled me in after that. So I'll skip it.