FALL TV EXTRAVAGANZA!!!

 

TERRA NOVA

 

 

** (out of ****)

Fox has a history of giving unique TV shows a chance, and then pulling the plug way too soon.  When they finally committed to Terra Nova, they committed balls deep.  Instead of ordering a pilot, they poney-ed up for an entire 13 episode first season – at 4 million bucks a pop.  If there’s a reason they’ve finally decided to put all their eggs in one basket it’s because they’ve found a show that’s about as ‘can’t miss’ as they come.  Terra Nova is probably one of the coolest ideas for a TV show to come out in years.  It’s awesomely high concept, not a remake of something and best of all, dinosaurs.  Throw in Spielberg as an EP and it has basically everything possible going for it.  For all that, the end result is a two star pilot.  That’s only a star an hour.  What happened?  Not a whole lot, actually.  There was a ton of exposition, which you have to expect, but so much of it wasn’t even necessary to the story.  I know a lot about the world this TV show lives in, but I don’t have much to be excited about.  The worst part?  No money shot.  The pilot for Game of Thrones was actually pretty boring too, and it had to be, but it gave you something to look forward to in the next episode.  I’m basically advocating the Lost ‘twist-an-episode’ approach, but it works for a reason.  Terra Nova also loses at least half a star just for dialogue.  Way too much “How could you not know about X?  Let me explain X to you.”  or even worse, “Let me explain X for no god damned reason at all.”  All that said, this is only pilot.  The episode itself didn’t exactly wow me, but the concept is still there and they laid the groundwork for a lot of really interesting story-lines.  This may be a show that becomes insanely good about 3 episodes in, or it may continue to be a show that has people getting eaten by dinosaurs and still manages to be boring.  Time will tell. -DT