This is the place to speak your mind about the pilot episode of the CANE tv drama about a wealthy Cuban American family who runs a sugar and rum business.

Each week we will start another thread to discuss each particular episode. This week’s episode is simply title “Pilot” from what we can tell.

Here is more info on the cast and crew of CANE.

Here is an excerpt from a review by the Palm Beach Post describing the pilot episode of CANE:

In the original pilot sent to TV critics in May, Cane was clearly set in Palm Beach County. It’s now based in the fictional Florida community of Playa Azul.

Lost in all the local controversy, however, is that Cane, a sprawling soap in the lavish Dallas and Dynasty mold, has the potential to be a terrific, character-based drama.

Cane tells the rich tale of the juicy external rivalries and internal family power struggles of the Duques.

In the opener, the ailing family patriarch, Pancho (Chicago Hope’s Hector Elizondo), gives control of his company to his adoptive son, Alex (NYPD Blue’s Jimmy Smits), a level-headed executive who married Pancho’s daughter, Isabel (Paola Turbay).

The move doesn’t please his eldest biological son, Frank (Lost’s Nestor Carbonell), a skirt-chaser who’s often distracted - and handcuffed - by wealth’s trappings.

Meanwhile, the Duques must contend with their rivals, the Samuels, a slithery bunch who are offering the Duques a shady deal to buy 175,000 acres of their sugar cane fields. There’s also a smart, West Wing-ish plot line revolving around sugar-based ethanol as an alternative source of fuel.

And for the hip, young viewers CBS obviously is hoping will watch, the producers made the youngest Duque brother, Henry (Eddie Matos), a budding club owner so the series can attract hot music acts.

The new sugar-family series ‘Cane’ raised some local controversy, but this nighttime soap shows real promise by Kevin D. Thomspon

Here’s a bad review of the pilot episode by Robert Bianco of USA TODAY:

Even top Latino talent can’t raise ‘Cane’

You can put a weak old rum in a bright new bottle, but you’ll still get a lousy drink.

One of TV’s all-too-frequent attempts to pass off a moldy idea as a fresh new concept, Cane takes your standard-issue family-dynasty soap and tries to give it a Cuban spin —Dallas by way of Little Havana. Latinos of all stripes are absurdly underserved by network TV, but surely they deserve a more potent cocktail than Cane.

Yet the show does have one saving grace, beyond fulfilling its target audience’s natural desire to see themselves represented on screen. Leading an otherwise hit-and-miss ensemble are three truly wonderful actors, Jimmy Smits, Hector Elizondo and Rita Moreno. You can’t help rooting for them even when the show is failing them and, in Smits’ case, when he’s failing the show.

Read the entire review here.

I can see why they said the show is very expensive. There were several elaborate sets and a large cast.

For this reason I’d say the show has to have high ratings otherwise I would think CBS will kill it.

Overall, the script was satisfactory. I suppose I have to get to know the characters better.

Overall, the acting was satisfactory. I was listening for the Cuban dialect but didn’t hear it much.

So, overall I’d give the pilot a 6 with high hopes for future episodes.

If someone knows how to check the ratings, please post here.