Intermission 009 - Terra Nova time. (Page 1 of 3)

Don't tease me like that, Trey! I live in Fort Worth! I'm one hour away from Dallas by train!

I wish.

From what I remember of the pilot, the Sixers came over on the Sixth Pilgrimage to Terra Nova. I have no clue why they all became evil.

For whatever reason, this episode showed up in the feed with a date of 12/31/10. Not a big deal, but it means iTunes felt it was an old episode and thus didn't automatically download it.

My problem is that the expanded view of 2149 actually raised more questions.    It's akin to the Matrix sequels for me, the more they tried to justify everything, the deeper a hole they dug for themselves.   

In the original TN pilot you see almost nothing of the world, all I can tell ya is that having seen both versions, the original worked better.  Bonus, there was less cutesy family interaction as well.

This person was, a bit.  But Wall-e seemed to suggest that the Earth was wrecked by rampant consumerism that used up all the resources and left nothing but trash.   Also, it was a cartoon.       Terra Nova specifically says that the skies are so smoky that people can't see the Moon, and I still wanna know how "overpopulation" caused that.  It's not a 1-1 thing.

That wasn't the analogy, and Daktari was the very example I had in mind.  The point is that Daktari was NOT about the family being attacked by the local wildlife every week.  Every so often, sure.  But not EVERY week.  Better still, Daktari was about a veterinarian and his family, so the premise itself justified weekly interaction with the local fauna.   

Meanwhile, Terra Nova is about people who don't want to get attacked by dinosaurs and have taken reasonable precautions to avoid them.  But it was sold to the audience as Jurassic Park Every Week, and so they're stuck with contriving weekly dinosaur encounters, which often makes the characters look like idiots.   

If Fox wanted a Little House in the Cretaceous, as they say TN was intended to be, they should have used Daktari as an inspiration, because that really was Little House on the Serengeti.

One thing I wish I HAD done was draw a clearer line between the "writers" and the network - more than once I blamed the "writers" for things that may not really be their fault.  I did say that the original pilot was better than the final result - clearly somebody was trying to do a darker, grittier show, and the network changed that.   

There are actually some talented writers on the Terra Nova staff, and it may well be that they've been fighting a weekly battle to put on a good show.  But based on what's made it on the air, they're not having a lot of success with that.

Now who's nitpicking?   

I was about to post a link to "Pan Am for Dummies" - a great xtranormal.com video created by an anonymous Pan Am staffer, but it seems to have been pulled offline.  Which isn't surprising, it was pretty scathing.

Basically it was a satirical conversation between a Pan Am writer and an ABC network exec.  The writer is arguing that Pan Am is supposed to be a highbrow show about international intrigue, and the network exec argues that it should focus more on the stewardesses and their shoes.  At one point the writer says (I'm paraphasing) "I didn't realize sodomy was part of my contract" and the exec answers "Yes, and if you don't bend over, we'll hire writers who will".

Deadline.com featured the video, and I'm sure a lot of phones were ringing as a result.   But it was freakin' funny, so if anyone stumbles on a copy, plz post.  .   

Anyway, I suspect that it's pretty much the same story over at Terra Nova.

I feel like I'm going to totally disagree with Trey when I listen to this. I *loved* the pilot.

I've felt the show be a little shakey in the first few episodes, as all shows except LOST and Twin Peaks are, but it's REALLY picked up now, especially as Elizabeth's old flame has joined the cast. It's *not* about dinosaurs attacking every week. It's about human drama and starting a new civilization.

It is, sure, basically the original concept for LOST, before they brought in JJ Abrams and Damon Lindelof and made it a sci-fi mystery, but, then, I kinda have always wanted to see that show.

I gave up on Terra Nova after the episode with the Newt from Aliens clone in it......

The movie stunk but Relic did have a badass creature design.

I don't mind references but this was lazy. I then thought- 'Game over, man, game over!' and I haven't watched it since

That show never interested me at all. In fact, Falling Skies did interest me until I watched about ten minutes of it. There would appear to be a trend in trying to make these crazy high-budget shows where people are trying to survive in some post apocalyptic or otherwise harsh environment now that Lost is over. You've got TN, Falling Skies, Walking Dead and then you had that Flash Forward, Invasion and a bunch of other little shows that lasted one season or less.

All of those shows suck. Hell, Lost sucked. I didn't like it, at least. Half of my problem is that I don't watch TV anymore, so whenever I try to catch one of these shows I'm reminded why I stopped watching TV in the first place. Some people have said that TV is where all of the good dramatic writing happens now, and I would have to disagree. Prime time TV looks to me like subdued soap operas with decent effects budgets.

But I probably shouldn't even have an opinion. I don't think I've seen a full episode of any of these shows, only caught 15 or 20 minutes here and there. What I've seen of them is largely people standing around arguing about stuff, and one of those people is usually the bad guy who always causes the problems. Ever seen Lost in Space? That show had stuff happening, not just people arguing about shit or talking about shit.

I've not actually seen Walking Dead, but it's a zombie show. This latest zombie craze has been going on since friggin 28 Days Later. That's almost a solid decade of zombie shit. This trend needs to have it's brain destroyed. I hate zombies.

Last edited by Squiggly_P (2011-11-12 21:24:16)

I'll just add that I've come to hate story arcs. Oh, they were great at the beginning. Loved the continuing story lines on the NBC dramas like LA Law, Babylon 5's 5 year arc was a great experiment, etc. But, now? EVERYTHING has story arcs! You can't turn on a drama seemingly without it expecting you to catch every episode. Even the new Doctor Who has been infected. Can't we just have ONE season of the Doctor where each episode stands on its own? It would be so refreshing!

(My sister over the years has stopped watching all TV dramas, as she'd always be behind. Now, unless it's on Netflix she won't see it)