Wynonna Earp does not put its best foot forward on the first episode, especially regarding the cinematography. If I could pick one word to define the cinematography of the show it would be “bland.” When it comes to how the show is shot and how it looks, Wynonna Earp does nothing to stand out from the crowd.

The way Wynonna Earp is shot is incredibly boring. This is illustrated best in how the show handles dialogue. There are, for the most part, two way the show shoots its dialogue. The first way is what I will call the “play method”. This is when dialogue is shown with a wide shot from the front which is basically what one would see if one was watching a play. This way of shooting dialogue is the most uninspired way possible. It’s how movies one hundred years ago were shot before people figured out how to movie. It’s also the same way High-schoolers do it for school projects. Plain and simple, the play method is incredibly lazy, even for TV standards.

The “play method” is dialogue shot as if the viewer were watching a play.

The second way the show shoots dialogue is the classic shot reverse shot. This is a film technique where the camera faces one direction towards a character and then the opposite direction towards another character. Most commonly, the character being filmed is the one speaking. In Wynonna Earp, whenever the dialogue is not the play method it is shot reverse shot, usually over the shoulder. With this method of shooting, Wynonna Earp succeeds in using an actual film technique. Congratulations! Unfortunately, this technique has become stale because it is so ubiquitous. However, that is not to say it cannot be innovated upon. For example, the Coen brothers are famous for filming the reaction of the character not speaking as the other character speaks. Unfortunately, once again Wynonna Earp makes no such innovations.

Shot reverse shot: One character is filmed from one direction and the second character is filmed from the opposite direction.

Overall, Wynonna Earp lacks any creativity when it comes to how the show is shot. None of the shots are original or even cool in any way. All the shots seem the same which is terrible for the show. It makes the show boring to look at, regardless of how interesting the dialogue is. Simply put, the look of the show is totally bland.