SPOILER ALERT: The following contains spoilers for Breaking the Deadlock Episode 6.
Breaking the Deadlock may be the most important show on television. The PBS series is thrillingly tense, thought-provoking, emotional and even often funny—all while flying under the radar. That’s because what this show has done is achieved the seemingly impossible: made education and information no longer a passive exercise. Now, it’s an active pursuit.
The best way to describe Breaking the Deadlock is that it’s Dungeons & Dragons for real life. Instead of fighting dragons or monsters, the quests are about major social and political challenges, from the rise in online gambling to safeguarding elections. Instead of your friends, your adventuring party now consists of some of the smartest people in the room, each of them roleplaying a different character. And acting as the Dungeon Master is UC Davis professor Aaron Tang, whose job it is to craft an engaging story and make sure you don’t lose sight of the goal.
That format—spearheaded by producers Andrew Lack and John Bredar—makes all the difference. It repackages information that is usually dry and hard to digest into something that viewers can understand, and even more importantly, want to understand. Because instead of a bunch of talking heads speaking at the audience, in Breaking the Deadlock, the audience has to play the game. The fictional state of Middlevania is a really interesting place to live.
It’s impossible to watch a Breaking the Deadlock episode and not ask yourself what you would do—not even in the big picture, but in the context of that specific scenario. Tang presents the panelists with a hypothetical that often starts as small as an individual family. From that point, other characters are introduced, each with their own questions to answer. They may know each other; they may not. Their problems may be connected; they may not. But the viewer is able to see these micro-scenarios and then over the course of the hour, follow all the pieces until they’ve assembled the bigger puzzle. They’re engaged within the fictional story, so the big picture comes to them.
And that breaks down one of the barriers to entry when it comes to having these kinds of important conversations: starting it in the first place. Many average people don’t want to talk about politics. They don’t necessarily want or know enough to talk about AI or end of life decisions. They may say that something like gambling doesn’t apply to them. But Breaking the Deadlock removes that intimidation or that nervousness or that apathy. It does a wonderful job of inviting the audience in and giving them a seat at the table. It also makes sure they get something back from being there.
In the room of Breaking the Deadlock, the fictional roles aren’t the only characters. The audience gets to see the personalities of each of the panelists and how they play off each other. It humanizes them in a sense; these aren’t just public figures on a soapbox giving out their point of view. They’re people who can be emotional and even funny. The production team first does a great job of finding people who come to the table in good faith; knowing that everyone on the panel is there to have a discussion and not “win” an argument means everybody is more relaxed and not putting on some public persona. But the writers also have fun with their hypotheticals and set a clear tone where serious topics don’t necessarily mean deadly serious conversation. Most of the fictional roles are tailored to each person’s background, but there are often surprises. Panelists may find out on the spot that they’re married to each other. They might unexpectedly learn that they’ve got a new relative. They could suddenly become the President of the United States. No one knows until Tang tells them, and one of the most fun parts of the show is watching their reactions.
In the most recent episode, “A.I.: Who’s In Control?” (which you can watch for free above), panelists Campbell Brown and Josh Tyrangiel were told they’re suddenly married and now parents of an eight-year-old. That probably wasn’t what they were expecting, but they went with it. And it yielded some genuine laughs later in the episode, when Brown asked if she was allowed to pick a fight with her husband. Mark Cuban appeared in “How to Fix an Election” and was able to poke fun at himself. In an earlier installment, Roger Severino managed to start in one position, get himself promoted, and then get fired. He had a whole mini-character arc all on his own. Other episodes have seen panelists share deeply personal stories—stories they likely did not plan on sharing on national TV—particularly “A Matter of Life and Death.” There’s personality that comes out, not just talking points. And when we begin to see institutions and issues as people, not just things, that makes all the difference.
Credit must also be given to Tang, who is the perfect moderator to oversee something that is both so important and a little freewheeling. He also helps to set the tone with his genial approach and ability to play back at the panelists; he’s not afraid to rib them a little, for instance joking during the aforementioned fake argument that “Deadlock thrives on marital strife.” (Which is actually a little bit true if one watches past episodes, and that made the joke funnier.) But he’ll also push them, too, asking a follow-up question if one is warranted. He’s not just there to structure the show; he’s keeping all those plates spinning and making it look fun.
Because as the title indicates, Breaking the Deadlock isn’t a debate or a competition. The scenario has an ending, based on the choices made, but nobody wins or loses. The point is to find common ground, or at least areas where the issue goes from here. There are two episodes that particularly stand out in that respect and explain why this show is so special: “Truth Under Fire,” which deals with the topics of education and social media, and “A.I.: Who’s in Control?” The former, one of the earliest episodes, starts with something deeply personal to many people: religion. It can be something very polarizing to discuss. Yet over the course of the hour, people who don’t share each other’s views are coming together for a common good, and the mutual respect in the room becomes obvious. Breaking the Deadlock models the kind of civil discourse that the world needs more of.
Yet that doesn’t mean everyone has to come to the same conclusion. “A.I.: Who’s in Control?” has some of the most crosstalk between panelists, who are willing to ask each other questions and want to know how they came to certain conclusions. There’s always a fair amount of that in every episode, but this time there are whole detours into areas that are just one small part of the overall scenario. One of the strongest segments is when Astead W. Herndon explains to his fellow panelists why A.I. is not a good influence in the newsroom. They genuinely don’t grasp his objection to a writer “improving” their draft with A.I., and there’s a brief discussion about it as he describes the importance of the human element in the press. You can see the other panelists getting it, and they genuinely want to understand. This show creates a safe place for everyone to play, whether it’s having a difference of opinion or sharing something that’s difficult.
What Breaking the Deadlock has that other political shows don’t and other panel shows don’t is a heart. It connects with the audience and even with the panelists themselves on an emotional level. That doesn’t replace the facts; there’s another noteworthy bit in “A.I.: Who’s in Control” in which Brown points out the misinformation regarding A.I. from both sides and suggests that the first step is clearing it up. But what comes out in each episode is that those facts become tangible and meaningful. They’re not statistics on a page or in a political campaign ad. They’re talking back to the TV because you disagree, or sharing in a panelist’s grief because they’re talking about a personal loss, or laughing about something you may have never felt you could laugh at before because it’s too serious. The end of every episode feels like a journey. And the more people who PBS can get to take that journey, the better.
Full episodes of Breaking the Deadlock are streaming for free on the PBS app and the PBS YouTube channel. Photo Credit: Courtesy of PBS.
Article content is (c)2020-2026 Brittany Frederick and may not be excerpted or reproduced without express written permission by the author. Follow me on Twitter at @BFTVTwtr and on Instagram at @BFTVGram. For story pitches, contact me at tvbrittanyf@yahoo.com.
