TERRA NOVA - MANIA: TV Wasteland: Steven Spielberg Presents Land of the Lost
Otherwise known as Terra Nova...
By Rob Vaux
September 25, 2011
The biggest gamble of the season lands on Fox Monday as Steven Spielberg unveils a new dino-centric series that could make or break genre programming for years to come. Terra Nova posits a time-travel scenario where future residents of a ravaged Earth journey back to the Cretaceous Period and attempt to eke out a new “future” for mankind. There’s a lot to get excited about – putting the words “Spielberg” and “dinosaurs” together creates a magic tingle, and the presence of Avatar bad-ass Stephen Lang in the cast sets a lot of concerns at ease.
On the other hand, the show also raises some troubling questions. How convincing will the effects be? Will they overwhelm the storyline? Conversely, will budgetary constraints leave us with nothing but people shouting at each other amid the ferns and palm trees? Then there’s the show’s supposed centerpiece of an “ordinary family” in these surroundings… prompting hideous visions of dating issues and workplace rivalries while velociraptors run rampant around them.
The biggest concern is that Terra Nova is on Fox, which does not treat struggling genre shows kindly. A nightmare scenario entails a great show, middling ratings and a time slot that bounces from day to day before an agonizing cancellation watch midway through the season (aka Firefly redux). As we said, it’s a risk: for the show, for the network and for any fans who tune in. But it also qualifies as something a little different in an era when the Big Four Networks are hedging their bets in every conceivable way. In the spirit of good television, we wish it all the best. We’ll all see what it has to show us this Monday night, September 26, at 8:00 PM EDT...
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