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Created by Matt Miller, it centers on the character of Dr. Henry Morgan, an immortal New York City medical examiner who uses his extensive knowledge to assist the New York City Police Department (NYPD) in solving crimes and to discover a way to end his immortality. Flashbacks within each episode reveal various details of Henry's life.
The series' network aired a sneak preview on September 22, 2014, and resumed the series at 10 p.m. EST on September 23, 2014. Reception of the series was mixed. In the United States, television critics were divided over the series' similarity to other crime dramas and its premise. In contrast, voters in several online polls ranked the series as one of the best of the television season.
Although ABC gave the series a full-season episode order on November 7, 2014, it cancelled Forever after one season. ABC cited the show's low ratings as the rationale behind the decision.
Television critics believed that other factors explained the network's decision, as the show gained viewers who watched up to seven days later on their DVRs. Fans of the series reacted strongly, creating a social media campaign to save the series; despite these efforts, the series remains canceled.
More information: Just Watch
Dr. Henry Morgan (Ioan Gruffudd) is a New York City medical examiner who studies the dead for criminal cases, and to solve the mystery of his own immortality.
His first death was 200 years ago while trying to treat a slave as a doctor aboard a ship in the African slave trade; one of the ship's owners becomes frustrated with the time and effort Henry is putting into this and orders him to stop, shooting Henry and throwing him overboard when he fails to comply.
Each time he dies, Henry disappears almost immediately and returns to life naked in a nearby body of water, the only sign of injury being a scar at the site of his original gunshot wound from long ago. He has also stopped aging.
Henry's long life has given him broad knowledge and remarkable observation skills which impress most people he encounters, including New York Police Department Detective Jo Martinez (Alana de la Garza). Only antiquarian Abe (Judd Hirsch), whom Henry and his now-deceased wife Abigail found as a newborn in a German concentration camp during World War II, knows that he is immortal.
Henry is stalked by Adam, who is also an immortal, and claims to have been alive for around 2,000 years.
He created a character who viewed immortality as a curse because of the pain of seeing family and friends die and who would attempt to find a way to end his immortality. That concept informed Miller's decision to make his character a doctor-turned-medical examiner who used his occupation for research into his immortality and Miller's decision to structure the series as a procedural. The details about the character's immortality and his ability and his desire to end it would serve as the series' main story arc.
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Another series-long story arc explored how other people learn of Henry's immortality. The first storyline in the arc was the season's second story arc, Henry's determination to learn the identity of a second immortal who knows about it.
The second immortal character's morals would contrast his protagonist's morals, serving as an antagonist for the main character. As for the family element, Miller created a family with a 35-year-old immortal having a mortal son in his 70s.
Miller stated in an interview with BuddyTV writer Catherine Cabanela that he had never seen that type of family on television before, and he believed that it provide the show with an emotional element.
To demonstrate Henry's immortality, Miller decided that Henry would die and would feel the pain every time he died. Anything on Henry's body would disappear with his body during each death.
Miller felt that Henry's naked rebirth in water would be an interesting way to keep the show's protagonist alive during the series by completing the death and rebirth process; the nakedness would create several comedic moments within the series.
Miller intended to use Henry's death and rebirth process sporadically after the first two episodes so that the series would focus on Henry's long life.
The first person cast was Judd Hirsch as Abe. When Miller and casting director Barbara Fiorentino developed a list of actors for the role, they felt that Hirsch would be the best actor to portray Abe. Hirsch was the first person asked about the role. When they sent the script to him, Hirsch liked the series' premise, its historical aspect, its intelligence,and the idea that the audience would see life from Henry's perspective.
Two days after casting Hirsch, Ioan Gruffudd was cast as Dr. Henry Morgan. Miller wanted the actors to read the script so that he could see whether the audience would believe that the man had been alive for over 200 years.
The search for an actor to portray Henry was more difficult than Miller expected. Miller and Fiorentino unsuccessfully auditioned actors from New York City, Los Angeles, Canada, London, Australia, and South Africa for the role, but the role was uncast.
One day, Miller noticed Gruffudd in the carpool lane while they picked up their children from preschool. For Miller, Gruffudd's period work, such as in the series Horatio Hornblower, made him an obvious selection for the role. Gruffudd liked the script and felt that he could portray Henry. The story, the science fiction element, and the believability also attracted Gruffudd to the role.
More information: Forever Fandom
Alana de la Garza was cast as NYPD Detective Jo Martinez. The show's procedural aspect, the series' serialized nature, and the believability of the world interested de la Garza. She also liked the idea that, in contrast to de la Garza's characters on other procedurals, Jo had flaws.
Beginning with the pilot, Miller structured each episode by telling two stories in the episode. The first was a traditional procedural plotline. The second story was a flashback from Henry's past.
The flashback either related to the episode's main present-day storyline, such as Henry's involvement in investigating the Jack the Ripper case, or was a scene from Henry's backstory, such as his life in the Lower East Side's tenements in the 1890s. Both the father-son relationship between Henry and Abe and one of the two season-long story arcs, Henry's relationship with his wife Abigail, were told through flashbacks.
When planning an episode, the writers started with the idea for the episode and determined the main story arc. They discussed which plot element could be associated with a previous incident from Henry's life and how the flashbacks connected the two stories. From there, they determined Abe's viewpoint about the case or his connection to the case. Then, they planned the story on whiteboard.
One plot device used in the pilot, Henry's pocket watch, proved to be difficult to use in subsequent episodes. In the beginning, the writers would have Henry's pocket watch fall out of his pocket so that it would not disappear with the rest of his body. It became more difficult for writers to develop believable scenarios in which Henry would lose his watch, so they did not write it into the plot as frequently in later episodes.
Miller and the filming crew had planned to film the rebirth scenes in the pilot in several bodies of water, but they could film it in only one location. During the episode's production, Gruffudd and the crew filmed the rebirth scene against a green screen in a university swimming pool due to the strength of the East River's current. The crew later covered Gruffudd with water.
To depict Henry's death in different years, the crew refilmed the scene with Gruffudd wearing various hair styles. The producers then edited the scene by superimposing the film of Gruffudd's swim in the pool with film of the East River to give the illusion that the scene occurred in the river.
More information: IMDb
and we need to hang on to them.
But Emily Dickinson wrote,
'Forever is composed of nows,'
and she's right.
If we root ourselves too deeply in the past,
we'll miss what's right in front of us.
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