Brew Masters review

It's never fair to form resolute conclusions on a TV show based on its pilot. For the sake of Brew Masters, a show I truly wanted to like, I'm going to observe that rule and not be too harsh.

Pilots need to introduce a show and its principal characters to a new audience, setting up both an immediate plot for the episode at hand, and long-term themes that project what the show intends to become in the not-too-distant future.

As such, they're prone to a sort of hand-holding exposition, wherein people are constantly telling you exactly what you're supposed to think about someone or something, with little in the way of organic evidence that those conclusions are in anyway valid.

In the case of "Bitches Brew," the pilot ep of Brew Masters, this comes in the form of a hammer-over-the-head insistence by the show's creators that we see Sam Calgione and his Dogfish Head Brewing Co. as a Jeffersonian symbol of individual liberty and a quintessentially American endeavor, respectively.

Sam's a local guy with humble beginnings, we're told ad nauseum, and his brewery bucks conformity, is a bastion of innovation and is above all else true to its ideals of experimentation--freedom-- in the realm of drinking beer.

In short, they spend 30 minutes spoon feeding the conclusion you came to the first time you read "off-centered ales for off-centered people" on a Dogfish beer bottle: damn, these pretentious fucks really take themselves seriously.

And you'd be right to think so, whether the thought was born from a bottle of beer or from a formulaic reality show on the Discovery Channel. But that doesn't mean they don't make good beer, nor does it mean the show can't be good.

The first episode was bad, to be sure.

Half of it was devoted to an assemblyline mishap devoid of even the token drama, heightened by a score of frantic string notes, to be sure, characteristic of most reality shows.

A piece of machinery is lost, most likely in a beer bottle. Assembly must halt until the part is found. If the part isn't found, $7,000 of beer will be lost to the Milton, Del. sewage system so as to avoid a lawsuit. Ten minutes of explaining the stakes follow. Then the part is found. Crisis averted.

The other half of the episode is legitimately interesting, and if it is the basis of the series, I expect to continue tuning in each week.

Sam wants to make a limited-edition beer to coincide with the anniversary of Miles Davis' seminal recording, Bitches Brew.

Incorporating flavors and traditions from Africa with those of America, the Bitches Brew beer will look to reflect the culture-fusing relevance of jazz generally, and Davis' 1970 hybrid record specifically. It'll be a dry imperial stout fused with an African-style honey beer made with gesho root.

The episode's at its most interesting when Sam and the other brewers are discussing the beer, how they'll achieve the desired flavors, and the self-imposed deadline within which they're working so they can unveil the offering at, Savor, a hoity-toity beer snob event in D.C.

Along the way, there are hints that Sam is the passionate advocate for good beer, and all relevant denunciations of cultural hegemony contained therein, that his company's marketing department keeps telling you he is.

When he's discussing the beer with impressed connioseurs at the event, it's a window into the finer aspects of his job and the trendy craft-beer scene in general. He and the experts engage in thoughtful consideration of what they're drinking, trade sincere suggestions for improvement, and Sam explains his intentions in more honest terms than we were provided during his talking-head segments in the rest of the episode.

For a man whose niche celebrity revolves around the fact that he's an honest hardworking chap just like you, and honest hardworking chaps like us are the backbone of this country, Calgione comes across as decidedly insincere and ready-made for much of this episode.

In the rest of the episode, he comes across as a talented guy who cares a hell of a lot about making good beer.

Of the above two scenarios, one is the basis for a show I want to watch, and the other is a basis of a reality show on Discovery's sister network, TLC, that premiered a week ago.

*I haven't had Bitches Brew, and since it's a limited release, I'm unlikely to do so while living in San Diego. Maybe Jason can find it at a store and provide some notes on it.