Tuesday, July 12, 2011

REVIEW: Torchwood Miracle Day - The New World

THE NEW WORLD

Without any new Doctor Who right now I decided to fill my TV reviewing void with the new Torchwood series; so just like the first episode of this season of Doctor Who, my first review of this series of Torchwood ends up being posted later than I wanted to.

Sorry.

This series of Torchwood has a buzz about it because it will be co-produced by STARZ an American movie channel network. The buzz I think is mostly filled by a lot of people expecting to hate it from the beginning; which I'm sure a lot of people will just based on those feelings.

I'm hoping the show will be good not just because I enjoyed previous series of Torchwood nor because of its Doctor Who tie-in but mainly becaue Mar really liked Torchwood and its a Doctor Who connection we can share. She enjoys Doctor Who and will watch it if its on and I'm watching it but Torchwood has been a series she has enjoyed.

And not just because of the hot boy on boy action.

But she loves that too.

So do I :)

This show is one of the few reasons we are keeping the movie channels. Matter of fact we never watch movies on these channels and only the TV series they are showing, stuff like Weeds, Game Of Thrones, Treme, Shameless, and now Torchwood. I just pray STARZ does a better job with Torchwood than another US channel did with The Prisoner. Great casting but shame on you American TV, shame.

I have enjoyed all of the seasons of Torchwood. I know a lot of people who either loved the first season and hate the second or the reverse. Children Of Earth seems to have an extreme like or extreme hate connection to it. I loved it. Mar loved it. The cats are in the middle.

Cats?

And all of that leads us to Miracle Day- The New World.

The new opening titles sequence were cool, simple, but I liked. I think they needed to make a change because of this season being a fresh start but they keep enough of the feel of the past series music and sound effects to remind you of the previous seasons.

After watching for a bit Mar commented, "I don't know if I like this."
Me, "You just don't like that their hasn't been any boy on boy action yet?"
Mar, "I miss Yonto."
Sad faces all around in the apartment.

And that's a good sign when Mar is talking about a show when watching it because she normally starts reading in the middle of shows if she has no interest; so commenting at all is a good sign that she might keep watching.

I have to say I think this first episode of this series is stuck between a rock and a hard place with how they have to approach all the returning characters because on one side you want to make it appeal to American audiences who haven't seen the show before but at the same time you can't ignore the past and old fans will expect little hints and comments about the past they know. I think this first episode balanced that out the best they could.

As with a lot of first episodes are all setup and you have to have that in mind when discussing them. I've talked about this before in past reviews so I wont dive deep into it here but its worth remembering that in a ongoing series of stories the first chapter will probably not knock you out of your seat. It can do both setup and knock you off your ass but that pretty rare.

I think with this series they have a good group of characters, with a good group of actors, that have the ingredients of making a very good series out of what I know about the overall story.

I'm sorry it took me so long to get my thoughts up, a lot of stuff going on this week, but next week I hope to get my thoughts on the next episode of Torchwood: Miracle Day up right away in more detail.

TORCHWOOD: MIRACLE DAY
THE NEW WORLD
3 out of 5 Stars

Share/Save/Bookmark

No comments: