Advance Review of ABC Family’s The Lying Game (Premieres Tonight!)

Tonight, ABC Family premieres their newest on-brand teen drama, The Lying Game, which is based on novels written by Sara Shepard, author of Pretty Little Liars.

The first time I saw anything related to The Lying Game and heard what it was actually about, it looked very intriguing to me. As is to be expected of anyone who’s been following new TV developments, I had the immediate reaction of “this sounds just like Ringer!” But actually now that I’ve seen the pilot (airing at 9PM ET tonight on ABC Family), I realize both are quite different, and in fact, The Lying Game may be the more relatable of the two to the target young audience.

So here’s the story in a nutshell: There are two identical twins, Emma and Sutton. Only one of them was adopted as a child – that would be Sutton – and she lived in luxury throughout childhood. Emma never was adopted, and went from foster home to foster home, with the latest being especially heinous and abusive (and wait until you see the hair on her foster mom – eesh). The run-down foster home is supposed to look all low-class yet it’s still bigger than what I could afford here in California. But anyway. Emma and Sutton have discovered each other, they keep in touch online, and when things go especially bad for Emma back at her foster home and she has to go on the run, she goes to Sutton. But Sutton has other plans… saying she has a lead on finding her birth parents. Since Sutton’s adoptive parents will wonder where she went, she tells Emma to fill in for her. Kind of Parent Trap without all the parents, right? Emma follows along, thinking this will all be over soon.

Sutton lives in a huge house, has a fancy car, and a “hot” boyfriend… two parents… things that Emma would have dreamed of. Her behavior at the home is different from what people are used to from the real Sutton, but it works, especially for Sutton’s younger sister who this “new” Sutton actually seems to be nice to. Some of Sutton’s present-day life is where I checked out a little: I had no interest or care for Sutton’s group of rich friends. Somewhere, between The CW and ABC Family, there must be an assumption (probably a correct one) that young people love seeing rich young people. But me? I couldn’t even tell you their names — though I like the rivalry between Sutton and Nisha, even though I had to look Nisha’s name up to write this sentence.

I also liked the relationship between Sutton and her younger sister, Laurel, played by Arielle Kebbel lookalike Allie Gonino. It’s clearly strained between her and the real Sutton. But Emma seems to almost enjoy having a sibling who treats her nicely, even though there’s the hidden feeling that Sutton’s parents, having two daughters, could have had two to begin with by adopting both of them. Sutton’s parents are decent; the father is somewhat generic but wise, but the mother… well… her mother is Supergirl, as she is played by the very beautiful and awesome Helen Slater.

Going back to the negative, I don’t care much for or about Sutton’s boyfriend either, though he does push the plot along. I’m more interested in finding more about Blair Redford’s character of Ethan. Thankfully, Redford is no longer affecting that fake accent he had as Oscar on 90210, and he’s given some much more interesting storylines here also.

The best-cast character in this pilot, though, is its lead, Alexandra Chando. Chando looks like what would happen if you genetically created someone out of the DNA of Sarah Michelle Gellar (yep, her again) and The Vampire Diaries’ Nina Dobrev. It’s almost uncanny. But she is great as both Sutton and Emma. This show does something that also annoyed me with Ringer – the twins have the exact same freckles, etc. – but I have to sit back and realize “it’s TV” and not take that so seriously.

The locations and the sets are fantastic, and The Lying Game left me with a feeling I can say for any good pilot – I wanted to see more. Fortunately, we’ll have more for the next several Mondays. If you’ve got nothing going on tonight – or hey, you want something to watch while you’re waiting for the season finale of Teen Wolf – this is a great choice. I have a feeling this show is going to become an addiction for a lot of people.

Here’s the trailer if you’d like to see it:

The Lying Game premieres tonight, Monday, August 15 at 9PM (ET) on ABC Family. Read more about the show here at KSiteTV and come talk about The Lying Game on our forum!