Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Tom Swift’ On HBO Max, A Confusing ‘Nancy Drew’ Spin-Off About A Young Scientist And A Big Conspiracy

The character of Tom Swift isn’t just part of the Nancy Drew universe on TV — Tian Richards guested as Tom during the second season in an episode that served as a backdoor pilot — but he’s also been depicted in a number of book series reaching all the way back to 1910. Swift has always been a science-minded young inventor, but that’s where Book Tom and TV Tom’s similarities end. A new CW series, now available to watch on HBO Max, spins Tom off into his own adventure.

TOM SWIFT: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: Flames swirl while we hear a voice over say: “Let me tell you about the Swift family. We’re not nerds; we’re Black nerds. Oh, and billionaires, with the fastest whips that money can’t buy. And swag.”

The Gist: Tom Swift (Tian Richards) is a brilliant inventor, but certainly immature. During his a press conference his father Barton (Christopher B. Duncan) holds to introduce their mission to Saturn, Tom is nowhere to be found, even though he harnessed a meteorite to create the fuel to get his father to Saturn and back in a year. His father finds him tweaking the propulsion system, shirtless and wearing super-tight pants.

His dad tells Tom that, while he’s on the mission, his assistant Claire Cormier (Brittany Ishibashi) will be the temporary CEO of Swift Enterprises, because he just doesn’t think Tom is mature enough. Six months later, Tom’s father has reached Saturn and is about to turn around when his ship explodes, right when Tom is communicating with it at a party. At the funeral, he breaks down when giving the eulogy, blaming himself. His friend Zenzi Fullerton (Ashleigh Murray) makes an eloquent speech in his place. His mom, Lorraine (April Parker Jones) finds out that he likely won’t be invited into the church’s exclusive society for high-roller parishioners, something she cares deeply about.

Tom seeks support from Congressman Nathan Eskol (Ward Horton), whose campaigns the Swifts have contributed millions to, to get the data on the explosion from the government database. When Eskol drags his feet, Tom decides to get the data himself, with the help Zenzi, his bodyguard/close friend Isaac (Marquise Vilsón) and the AI system he invented, Barclay (LeVar Burton). When he’s caught in the congressman’s computer room, one of Eskol’s bodyguards named Rowan (Albert Mwangi) helps him escape.

After Barclay investigates the data, he finds out that the explosion came from a missile that was shot at the ship and stuck to it as it flew to Saturn, set to detonate at the precise moment it did. But then Tom finds out another surprise: His dad escaped the explosion and he sends a hyperspace pod back with the info on how to find him. This is not long after Tom finds out that Eskol is associated with the rocket that shot down his dad’s ship.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Tom Swift is a spin-off of Nancy Drew, as the character of Tom first appeared during a backdoor pilot during Drew‘s second season. It has a lot of that show’s DNA, but there’s also a fair amount of sci fi and conspiracy theory material. It’s Nancy Drew meets Scandal meets The Martian.

Our Take: Tom Swift was co-created by Melinda Hsu Taylor, Cameron Johnson and Noga Landau, and it’s supposed to have the same sense of humor and daring as the shows the three have worked on, including Nancy Drew, Empire and The Magicians. But the first episode is just confusing, full of clunky dialogue, misplaced sex scenes, inconsistent characterization, and too much telling and not enough showing.

Two examples of the tell-not-show problem both involve Zenzi. Tom tells her that his father never completely accepted the fact that he was gay, and Isaac says the line “even trans guys have annoying exes.” Yes, we knew Tom was gay before he said the line, but now he’s leaning hard on it as a shorthand, very 1980s way to explain the complicated relationship it seems he has with Barton. And in Isaac’s case, it seemed like a way to shoehorn in the fact that he (and Vilsón) are trans when that information wasn’t pertinent at that moment.

We might have thought that, in 2022, the fact that Tom is gay is incidental to what he does and how brilliant he is. Does he have swag? Sure. But it feels that, like in most CW shows, sex is used as a tool just as often as brains and, you know, actual tools. But the writers seem to be leaning on it as a plot device, and it seems out of place.

It feels like crutches the writers use to speed things along, along with not knowing whether to make Barclay super-smart of comic relief. LeVar Burton deserves better than this role, even if it’s one he just did in a voice booth for a couple of days.

There is a story here, of how Tom is brilliant but immature, of how his father trusts him to find him after escaping the explosion. Even the conspiracy, which took a second to figure out, could be a decent one. But it’s layered in what we like to call “CW-ness,” which obscures substance with stylistic flourishes that don’t add much to the show.

Sex and Skin: Tom has sex with someone his mom introduced him to at the party celebrating Barton’s mission. But it’s clothed, broadcast network sex. And it seems Tom just had his own voice in his head the whole time.

Parting Shot: Eskol’s henchmen have put spyware in Barclay in order to track Swift’s moves. He asks them to not reveal their plans, and Rowan is among those who promise they’ll keep the secret.

Sleeper Star: Ashleigh Murray’s Zenzi is the only character that seems to be operating in the real world, which is always welcome on a show that’s not sure what it is.

Most Pilot-y Line: As he tries to eulogize his father, Tom, stops and says, “He’s dead! And it’s all my fault!” Well, um, yeah, at least about the first thing.

Our Call: SKIP IT. Tom Swift gets too stuck in its leaden dialogue and attempts at being edgy to tell a conspiracy story that makes any sense.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.