The Big Door Prize - Season 1

This show has a killer premise that doesn’t quite pay off, in my opinion. A mysterious machine appears in the general store of a small town, and whenever someone presses a button, it spits out a card that predicts that person’s “potential.” I’m into cool supernatural concepts, but what I ended up enjoying about the show was more the character relationships and the comedy (especially when delivered by Chris O’Dowd). There’s a tragedy and a secret hanging over the core characters, and I thought there was enough drama there without the extra mystery of the machine. We don’t find out enough about what the cards really mean to make it compelling; perhaps the pressure to set up a second season forced them to drag out the plot.