Reviews

What's notable watching this is how much story there is and how much seems to get glossed over. There's definitely way too much story here and this sometimes creates jarring tone shifts, particularly when the story shifts into the space mission to defect the comet.

There's also the strangely clipped story of the astronomer Wolf panicking and wrecking his car when he learns of the comet... this actually doesn't seem relevant to the story at all and could actually be cut. (And Wolf would NOT have shared credit for discovering the comet, Leo unambiguously discovered it. )

Anyway, there's pretty strong drama here that could be greatly expanded throughout the film. There's definitely enough real meat here to flesh out a full five or ten episode show.

There's some false notes. I can't believe the younger astronauts would be so disrespectful to the older Fish, even if they harbored suspicions Fish was put on the mission for his fame. Sorry, no, that man was still one of very few that went into space and landed on the moon, a VERY dangerous and prestigious accomplishment.

I just watched the director's cut. I saw the original back in the day but didn't find it memorable so I can't compare.

The acting is generally pretty good. Brosnan and Fahey are certainly not phoning it in. Brosnan is also very well cast here. But I think Fahey was miscast... or perhaps he was simply made up poorly when he was playing the mentally challenged Jobe. The frizzy hair not only doesn't look like what this simple man would do, it makes him look like an 80s hair band lead. That sounds like a joke but that's not intended.

It's certainly a movie of two halves, where the first half is far better than the second. The first half isn't spectacular but it's good enough that you expect a decent second half. Essentially, the now smart Jobe goes on a revenge spree. Fine, but his revenges take far too long, especially considering the "real world" fx here are godawful.

And these fx aren't "dated", they were incredibly subpar for the time. This was of the same year or two of T2 and Star Trek VI. I get that they surely didn't have that kind of budget, but they should have trimmed Jobe's revenges to the bone for this reason. Actually even if the fx here were great, all these scenes play out far too long.

I actually think there's a decent movie here that could be made by just taking the director's cut and trimming the second half as close to the bone as possible.

I had a bad feeling at around 30 minutes that they STILL hadn't built, and my worries were justified. This movie seems to basically all but ignore its premise for a very long stretch and focuses on the incredibly banal courting rituals of teenagers.

The kids here are likable and engaging, but not enough to focus on that kind of stuff considering the implications of their time machine. And the "s*** gets serious" strong around 3/4 in doesn't feel earned or even appropriate.

Also, a time travel story needs clear rules, and this one doesn't.

If you like the basic premise, I recommend the FAR stronger "Always Will". Now, that's a VERY low budget movie, but the logic makes sense and the stakes feel much more appropriate.

Ultimately, I recommend against. It does have its moments, like when the kids are photographed winning the lottery but they're all sad because they didn't win as much as expected.

"Les wanted to replace Scott Bakula with another actor because he thought he was terrible."

And I agree with him one hundred percent. To me, Bakula is a one trick pony at best and the "aw shucks" act worked in Quantum Leap, but he played Archer as Scott Beckett in space.

This is a bizarre episode in that it acts like Enterprise was some fantastic show subverted by uncaring executives. This episode acts like this was TNG with execs trying to boot Patrick Stewart. Ridiculous. I have no idea how good Moonves was, but he was certainly right about that.

I dislike the Captain Archer character as much as his actor. There is a suggestion that his position is due to nepotism, which makes sense but it's not exactly compelling.

To me, Trip was both the best character and the only actor that really delivered the Kirk/Picard/Sisko/Janeway energy.

I distinctly remember the following episode from this two parter from back in the day even though I was eleven. I suppose because of a certain character's... wound during the war.

I don't recall this episode at all, and don't like it at all.

First, it's just the first half of a soapy two parter.

It doesn't help that the two main characters/actors featured are my least favorite in the show.

Still, I don't buy any of the family and community being so hostile and dismissive of Jason's attempt to reopen the bar.

But the bigger problem by far is the soap elements. This woman showing up on the mountain, knowing who Mary Ellen is, seeking help with Curt. It's ridiculous.

What dates this more than anything is the presence of these anti nuclear weapons activists, a huge deal back then.

That makes the plot more convincing than it may seem now.

It seems several reviewers rank this against Threads... To me that's like which movie was better, Wrath of Khan or ET? Apples and oranges.

Anyway, there's so much about how this unfolds that is frighteningly plausible. Go look how many warheads were being produced back then. These terrorists/activists weren't exactly wrong. It's not that hard to believe a group of scientists would band together and do something like this back then.

Could they have actually gotten enough plutonium to make a functional bomb? I think that's the most unlikely element here, but I'm not sure that fundamentally changes the story. After all, they could quite credibly have just made a dirty bomb.

The government would be in quite a pickle to deal with this, and I think the government's actions here are entirely plausible.

Anyway, though the video quality dates this, the way the media presents the story is still pretty accurate.

As an aside, I agree with the other reviewer that it feels like we are sleep walking into nuclear war. I know people who are convinced we can beat Russia because our technology is better. Well, ok, maybe of Russia's thousands of warheads, only a few dozen get through. We have plenty of cities, we don't really need NY, LA, Dallas, etc.

I honestly think there should be a public hydrogen bomb demonstration explosion every 20 years so politicians and indeed everyone will remember what these things are like.

I see the complaints about this episode, and John Walton being hired for the highway job seems rather unlikely. Him even running off to the city to apply for it without telling Olivia seems ridiculous.

But at this time in TV, they weren't as bound to continuity as we are used to now. That's not intended as a slight, it was just a different perspective. And one that has its own merits.

I think the episode was entirely to give Ralph Waite the center seat, and it does exactly that. Waite was incredibly talented and, amidst the other quite talented cast, rarely got to really fly.

This was one of his focus episodes.

So basically, Grandma gets a letter saying she will be receiving what amounts to a small fortune and goes about spending it before it's received.

The script does a decent job of making this plot sound plausible, but even if I believed Grandma let that go to her head, i just can't see none of the other adults demanding restraint.

Of course, to this Depression stricken family, the money doesn't come and Grandma is left dealing with the wake of spending money that never came.

Where this is going is painfully obvious, but the cast still more than sells it. It still is striking just how solidly this show was cast.

Corby, always the stalwart, definitely shines. Grandma and JB's visit to the college is surprisingly charming.

Grandma/Corby's reaction to reading the letter the money isn't coming is particularly striking. She simply turns and walks out of the room. The way it's shot, it's not overplayed, she practically just walks off the set. It very well conveys her realization of what's happened.

If you were a child back then, Six Million Dollar Man and The Bionic Woman were "must see tv", to put it mildly.

The fembots were one of the most frightening of the franchise. Although I think this episode is weakest of the three, it's still quite good and this three part story was basically a mini movie, made for tv.

This trilogy had so many memorable moments. The one I remember most distinctly was when Jaime was fleeing Callahan's apartment and was forced to jump beyond her bionic capabilities and her legs all but exploded when she landed.

But there were many more. Steve in the lightning chamber, Steve watching Oscar crush a pencil, "Oscar" attempting to kill Jaime in the hospital, the abduction of Oscar. Great stuff!

The Six Million Dollar Man didn't get a series finale, nor did most shows of this era.

Not only did The Bionic Woman get a series finale in this episode, it was of a meta quality that would be unusual even today.

Jaime Sommers died in her first SMDM appearance. The character wasn't intended to be permanent, and Wagner took the role to fulfill her contractual agreement with the studio.

Jaime was so well received that the character was retconned to have survived, and the new show was created, and the rest is history.

Since Wagner wasn't signing up to be lead of a show when she took that SMDM role, let alone one that would require her to be in most scenes, and let alone one that was immensely popular.

Wagner's life was altered overnight to a degree that certainly echoed that of Jaime being suddenly transformed into a cyborg, and suddenly being a most important asset to a powerful organization. In Jaime's case, the OSI, in Wagner's case Universal.

A great episode, one of the best of the SMDM franchise.

I saw most of the Waltons when I wasn't even ten years old. It was a huge hit and I certainly liked it. It wasn't my favorite show, but I didn't mind it at all.

All these years later, the episodes can be unintentionally hilarious. In general, the dialog is absurdly on the nose.

But in this episode, there's a lengthy sequence at the end where the little boy had wandered off and the entire family is mobilized in the search.

I give all the actors thumbs up for working with what they had.

But the whole thing is surreal. It plays out like a massive FBI manhunt. I get that 2 year olds can be devils, but there's no way a child could get this far away in the woods such that the entire family can't find him.

And there's the moment when the baby is up on the bridge and John warns Mary Ellen not to startle him. Surreal.

I say it feels like Barry Lyndon because that film was acclaimed for filming with literal candle light. With the equipment of the time, this was quite a technical achievement.

Great, but who cares?

If you're making a technical achievement, super, but the story still has to pass. The underwater motion capture is the candle light.

I'm a big fan of Cameron and always marveled that I could pick a random scene from his movies and be entertained.

This one: no. It feels like a tired retread and nearly the same plot as the first one.

In a broader sense, there are way too many characters for a 7 hour movie. The rivalry between the teens should have been cut to the bone.

The Spider/Quarrich story was really the most interesting angle here, yet it seemed to be cut to nothing.

I always have admired Cameron vs Lucas because it always seemed he was striving to make new great stuff. If it were Lucas, we would have no new movies after the Terminators. Lucas would have remastered the original Terminator to get rid of the painful stop motion.

This one... I'm no filmmaker, but it feels like we should get back to fundamentals.

This season was such a wonderful send off for the Next Generation. Completely restored the goodwill that both Insurrection and (especially) Nemesis squandered.

The final two TNG films reeked of milking the corpse of a once great show. This season showed the proper respect to a show that reached the heights of TOS, and yes I'm aware I'm vaguely paraphrasing Sirtis.

The final two TNG films just made it like it was a Picard/Data/Worf show. Here, the rest of the ensemble is given lots of room. Particularly Beverly, but also Riker, Deanna and Geordi.

Picard and Data weren't best friends, Geordi and Data were!

I've got minor quibbles but this probably isn't the place.

I wonder if TV shows of this era were required to depict criminals as utter fools, lest everyone would decide to go out and become criminals.

That these criminals are able to carry out ANY type of burglary is so improbable, they are effectively the Twilight Zone version of Twilight Zone criminals.

The premise here with these silly cat burglars is played as a silly comedy, and all but completely squanders the potential of the premise.

There are plenty of stupid burglars in the real world, but they would never be as "successful" as these two are.

And why do I have to write a six hundred character review? That is an awful lot and results in a lot of filler words, extra spaces here and there, fewer contractions, and dumb comments like this as a part of reviews.

Another excellent Outer Limits mini-movie that feels like it could be expanded into a feature length film.

It's almost weird how rarely nuclear blackmail scenarios occur in movies and tv considering how provocative they are. Maybe because they are just too provocative, too scary, too plausible.

The scariest one that seemed pretty plausible remains Special Bulletin (1983). This OL episode is much less plausible primarily because it relies on technology that's probably impossible, and this one kid is a loner that gets a LOT done.

Still, this works better than ever because the theme isn't really about the "cold fusion" nuclear device, it's actually about the Fermi Paradox of all things. There's nobody out there because inevitably intelligent life learns enough through inexorable scientific discoveries that it destroys itself.

It also works in a somewhat less grandiose manner in that the ever increasing power of computer and other technologies makes it more and more possible for some small group to do some crazy James Bond supervillain scheme.

Nothing trailblazing here, it's basically Outer Limits' usual habit of cobbling together bits of older movies and such. This is sort of an Invasion of the Body Snatchers clone with a zombie variation, with ample touches from 80s Stephen King movies.

It's handsomely shot and mostly looks and feels like a movie. The animation of the slugs emerging from faces is pretty horrific and even fairly convincing.

There's a surprising reminder this was officially made for the cable channel Showtime... some brief nudity, including full male frontal.

The acting is mixed. The two leads are really good and Neil Patrick Harris is terrific. The secondary actors really good to rather questionable.

Overall, a decent mini movie that does successfully meld body snatchers and zombies, along with two appealing leads who create a convincing family backstory.

The stoned ape theory was interesting, basically the idea that humans evolved large brains and language because of our early versions eating psychedelic mushrooms. It's a very interesting point that language itself is essentially synesthesia on a massive scale.

Paul then immediately describes his first experience with magic mushrooms, where he massively overdosed, climbed the tallest tree on the tallest hill in a thunderstorm, and this somehow resulted in him curing himself of stuttering, which gave him confidence to hit on a girl he liked.

Seriously?

I'm certainly not qualified to judge the stoned ape theory, but it is provocative. Though while it's later suggested that there must be a profound reason that our brains react to these chemicals... I'm pretty sure most such biochemicals are poisons to deter consumption and that over time humans learned which ones are safe to eat. There is indeed an oddly unrelated comment that a tomato becomes bright red to tell you it's time to eat it. This is QUITE wrong in general, as most plants and animals with bright colors like that use them as a warning that they are quite poisonous. Tomatoes is in the nightshade family, mostly very poisonous.

I honestly missed that this was essentially a commercial until quite late in it. Certainly the magic mushroom overdose lightning storm stuttering cure story didn't lead me to believe I was supposed to take this guy seriously.

Some beautiful footage though.

Believe it or not, this is best Invasion of the Body Snatchers since the 1978 version.

It's also a new take, which is nice. The 50's film was about the snatchers taking over a small town, the 70's one about taking over a major city, the 90's one about taking over a military base. The 08 one was a mess, so whatever.

So, this one focuses on these late teen/early 20 kids, so why not?

The 08 "The Invasion" was an unmitigated disaster and best forgotten. The 90's one in the military base wasn't terrible (and had some spectacular moments like "where you gonna go...") but a base is rather esoteric to most viewers.

It's not quite spectacular. It's another one of those "footage" movies where the footage angle seems almost pointless. In this case, it does serve as a plot point, but it could have been easily achieved without it.

This movie also manages a way to update the "pod" people in a way that's effective and scary, with some sort of nanites. The 08 movie blew that off completely and turned the snatchers into a head cold.

I personally think the pods are so iconic they should always be worked into the story, difficult as it may be. "Pod people" is a powerful pop culture notion to this day because it hits deep.

I don't think they nailed it by any means and I wonder if they are dodging lawsuits but still not a bad movie at all.

The three young leads are very very good as is the young boy. The smaller roles aren't played terribly well, though it's clear they are playing "pod" people.

I could have done without the shots of the alien thing flying in the air. The nanite/aphid shots on the apple and elsewhere are quite effective.

There is also quite an effective and unexpected money shot where a trailer home is turned over with the heroes inside.

This is a very strange show because by and large, it looks great but generally has stunningly bad science.

The FX weren't always great, but the moon base looks quite believable. The Eagles were incredibly well realized utility ships. And the miniatures look like a million bucks to this day even in HD.

But despite how convincing all that is, the science is so ridiculous that a 10 year old would notice. This was in the mid 70s when the general audience was particularly well educated on matters of space travel because of the heady recent days of the Space Race. The "science" in this show was often worse than that of Lost In Space and felt like it would have come from the 50s.

At the start of the very first episode, the first words onscreen are "Dark Side of the Moon". Ugh, even Pink Floyd knew that made no sense.

And pretending the moon is a starship is so hilariously flawed. I could live with the moon somehow being ripped from orbit. A show's inciting event can be crazy and even impossible, especially if the characters note this as some mystery.

I could even live with the moon going through some space warp that gives it the speed to go through so many planetary systems.

But the problem is the speeds needed to reach these systems means the moon would be in these systems for minutes or seconds. Yet, somehow the moon manages to hang out near a planet for several days each week, as needed by the plot.

I do get some joy watching the show because I saw it in the 70s when I was 6 or 7. There are some decent stories and they were at least trying at times to make a thought provoking show. The first season was trying to bring Kubrick to the small screen and that's at least a bit ballsy.

Unfortunately, Lew Grade had no idea he was producing nonsense.