For those Doctor Who fans in the United States, last night was the premiere of The Sarah Jane Adventures on the SciFi channel. People who have watched the original series of Doctor Who know Sarah Jane (Elisabeth Sladen) as the companion for the Third and Fourth incarnations of The Doctor. After she left The Doctor, Sarah Jane was back to everyday normal life. Can a companion go back to "normal" life? Sarah Jane decided that she would help aliens who have crash landed on Earth instead. The first episode of the series ran for an hour and a half. Supposedly, people say that the show is "kiddified." However, I didn't find that to be true. Yes, the show is not as dark as Doctor Who but then again Sarah Jane isn't a TimeLord nor is she the last of her race. It's not as sexually charged as Torchwood but then again Sarah Jane said she couldn't find a man who was better than The Doctor. There are still aliens and gadgets and fighting. They are all just done in Sarah Jane's way. (I thought the Sonic Lipstick was cute!) I'm looking forward to future episodes and I hope that the show doesn't get written off as "childish" or something.
Tin Man - Part 3
After what seems like forever, I finally got to watch the ending for Tin Man. While the miniseries started out slow, I enjoyed the ending. There were a lot more references to the musical Wizard of Oz movie in this part. I think the biggest downside for the series was SciFi's marketing of it. In all of the commercials I've seen for the past few months, they've been calling it a "re-imagining" of The Wizard of Oz. Meanwhile, it's closer to a sequel than anything. Not a direct sequel but a sequel that takes place a long time after the original story ended. So I imagine that a lot of people were disappointed and there's probably a lot of people that didn't stick around to watch the third part, where they make a direct reference to the Dorothy of the first book. I think I would have preferred to see this as an actual series though. Perhaps with a one-hour timeslot. It would have been nice to have a bit more information on the Queen (I don't think she ever gets a name) and Raw and even Glitch. We learn a lot about Glitch but we only see a little bit of who he was before his brain was stolen. It would also be nice to see where things will go now. What will happen to the three friends? We get a pretty decent ending for DG, Az and their parents but we get nothing on the others. I doubt that we will see any sort of sequel to this so we'll just have to imagine what happens to them.
Tin Man - Part 2
I got to sit down and watch the second part of SciFi's Tin Man last night. I have to say that I liked the second part much better than the first. Obviously, the first third of the series was intended to introduce everyone to the characters and their surroundings. That alone tends to make a very boring story, especially when these are based on characters that we already know. In this part of the trilogy, we find out why Azkadallia is evil and DG's role in the O.Z. We also find out why Glitch's brain was stolen plus there's a bit of insight into Raw's character. After wondering how they were going to work him into the series, we finally get to meet Toto, though he's quite a bit different from the barking dog we're familiar with.
I don't want to give any spoilers away for those who, like me, weren't able to watch the show on it's original air date. I am definitely looking forward to the last part of the series. I think I may even be a bit sad when it ends.
Tin Man - Part 1
Last night was the first part of SciFi's new three-part miniseries, Tin Man. The story is loosely based on L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz series. Zooey Deschanel plays DG, a young woman who is transported from her small, rural farmhouse home to the Outer Zone, more commonly known as The O.Z. As she searches for her parents, who were also pulled into this new world, she befriends some strange characters. First, we meet Glitch (Alan Cumming), a man with half of a brain. The other half was stolen by the evil sorceress Azkadallia (Kathleen Robertson) because he knew too much about something but he can't remember what. Next the pair meets Wyatt Cain (Neal McDonough), a former police officer or tin man. Azkadallia's soldiers tortured him and his family before locking him in a suit of armor to watch a recording of the horrors repeatedly. Finally, the trio comes upon Raw (Raoul Trujillo), a psychic empath with healing powers. DG rescues him from being eaten by another creature.
I won't post spoilers here for those of you that haven't seen the series yet. Assuming that most people are familiar with The Wizard of Oz, I will let you know that DG and her friends make the trek down the brick road to meet the Wizard. There are definitely some variations from the Judy Garland version that we all know and love but that doesn't make the miniseries bad. I found the first part to be highly enjoyable. While it isn't an exact retelling of the story, I liked trying to figure out who was representing whom. The second part starts tonight, though we are recording it so we can watch the season finale of Heroes. If you missed the first part, SciFi is rerunning it tonight at 7PM Eastern, just before the second part starts at 9PM.