From Alan Sepinwall of the New Jersey Star-Ledger:

• ‘Defying Gravity’ review – Sepinwall on TV
  “Stop me if you’ve heard this one before — and if you’ve been watching ABC for the last few years, you have — but ABC’s Defying Gravity is about a group of young professionals being trained in a dangerous specialty with a high wash-out rate, where the main character has an infirm parent and frames each episode with metaphor-laden narration, and where the male lead (an authority figure) and the female lead (one of his students) have a drunken one-night stand the day they meet. Yes, Defying Gravity is more or less Grey’s Anatomy in space (or, as my friend Dan Fienberg has dubbed it, Grey’s Astronomy), with a splash of Lost and a cast of familiar faces from recent ABC dramas. But the game of Spot the Similarities (which also extends to Virtuality, the unsold pilot that Fox aired earlier this summer) is by far the most interesting thing about it.” Read more.

From Mandi Bierly of Entertainment Weekly:

• Defying Gravity star Ron Livingston: Space sex and the EW pop culture personality test
  “So what can Livingston, who stars as flight engineer/tragic hero/ladies man Maddux Donner, tell us about the series from former executive producers of Grey’s Anatomy and Desperate Housewives? There will be space sex. ‘The idea was, what’s a really cool workplace environment that we haven’t seen before,’ he says, burying the lead. ‘The astronaut corp halfway to Venus seemed like a cool place to go to work. Then a lot of stories follow from what needs to be done day-to-day. It also keeps the men and women cooped up in a confined enough space that the other half of the mystery from week-to-week is who’s gonna end up sleeping with who.'” Read more.

From Cassandra Szklarski of the Canadian Press:

• ‘Defying Gravity’ space series tackles love triangles, otherworldly forces
  “The romantic sci-fi series Defying Gravity, a new U.S.-Canada co-production, melds sexy love triangles with other-worldly mystery as it launches this weekend. U.S. star Ron Livingston leads an ensemble cast as a veteran astronaut on a six-year mission to explore the solar system and acknowledges there’s good reason the series has already earned the nickname Grey’s Astronomy.” Read more.

From Robert Lloyd of the LA Times:

• Review: ‘Defying Gravity’ on ABC
  “Ron Livingston, from “Office Space” and “Band of Brothers,” leaves Earth this weekend in “Defying Gravity,” a sci-fi series premiering Sunday on ABC. I will not be the only observer to remark on its coincidental superficial resemblance to “Virtuality,” the pilot by Ronald D. Moore and Michael Taylor (“Battlestar Galactica”) that Fox recently ran as a one-off TV movie. Each is set around a near-future space mission that confines its characters — some with prior issues and entanglements — in a relatively small space; in each, a mysterious force guides events; and each uses TV broadcasts back home as a narrative device.” Read more.

Continue reading In the news: More Defying Gravity reviews, interviews →

From Brian Lowry of Variety:

• Defying Gravity
  “Defying Gravity” telegraphs its aspirations in terms of commercial longevity — a six-year (God willing) space mission — but otherwise holds its cards close to its spacesuit. Frequently flashing back to build a soap opera around its sci-fi skeleton, this international co-production proves mildly intriguing and looks reasonably handsome but divulges only vague hints regarding its ultimate destination during the two-hour premiere. As a consequence, the storytelling needs to pick up momentum quickly if the show expects an audience to tag along on its planned journey to Venus and beyond.” Read more.

From Gary Strauss of USA Today:

• With ‘Defying Gravity,’ Ron Livingston is walking on air
  “Gravity focuses on eight astronauts on a six-year mission to explore the solar system, circa 2052. Though its space-travel premise skews toward sci-fi, Defying Gravity’s interplanetary setting serves as a backdrop for character-driven back stories, sexy romantic triangles and a mysterious plotline — or The Right Stuff mixed with Grey’s Anatomy and a bit of Lost.” Read more.

From Heather Havrilesky of Salon (contains spoilers):

• What if you set “Grey’s Anatomy” in outer space?
  “But bending the laws of physics on a space soap is where I draw the line. While I can understand why Parriott and Co. might be tempted to simply swap out the high-pressure hospital setting with a high-pressure intergalactic setting, the stupidity of Defying Gravity really knows no bounds.” Read more.

From Verne Gay of Newsday:

• ‘Defying Gravity’ on ABC is hard to praise
  “REASON TO WATCH Rare prime-time series set in space, plus chance to catch up with journeymen actors Ron Livingston (“Office Space”) and Malik Yoba (“New York Undercover”). But otherwise …” Read more.