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What Make The Critics Of BBC America’s New Prehistoric-Menace Series PRIMEVAL??
SPOILER ALERT !!
I am – Hercules!!
A 2007 British sci-fi hourlong about a handsome zoologist who discovers prehistoric creatures are invading England though time portals, “Primeval” was created by “Walking With Dinosaurs” vets Tim Haines and Adrian Hodges. It stars, among others, Harranh Spearritt, a member of the pop band SClub7 who played Joan in “Seed of Chucky.”
TV Guide says:
… The spirit of cheesy ’50s B-movies is fused with an ironic geek sensibility … mixes elements of “Jurassic Park” and Stargate, rarely taking itself seriously …
The New York Times says:
… Don’t expect any of the racy sex from “Torchwood.” But do expect other varieties of derivative silliness. … Maybe “Primeval” wants to serve as an exploration of the People’s Right to Know. Or maybe it wants to give rise to its own theme parks. But it definitely won’t make you forget about “Lost.”…
The Los Angeles Times says:
… I was bored. Stunningly, inarguably, reach-for-whatever-magazine-is-handy bored.… a lack of firepower is a good way to describe what ails the show. …
The Chicago Tribune says:
… has a low-key, shaggy appeal that should keep adults interested even as it entrances kids who are obsessed with all things T.Rex-related. …
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says:
… a rollicking adventure with decent special effects and better stories and character development than, say, Sci Fi Channel's "Eureka." …
The Boston Herald says:
Stupid humans chase stupid monsters. And who are we supposed to be rooting for here? … even its most basic target audience - 8-year-old boys and those who think like them - will be amazed at how moronically everyone in this series behaves.…
The Hollywood Reporter says:
… a crackling-good new BBC America sci-fi series thriller that's packed with vivid CGI prehistoric predators galore and a story line that's almost plausible. … The story line in the opening pair of "Primeval" installments is adequate but, in general, takes a backseat to the mind-blowing visuals. The plot occasionally almost feels tacked on to justify the next round of visual effects. But those computer-generated monsters and beasties are so good and realistic that it excuses a multitude of sins in the writing. …
Variety says:
… a strange but mostly entertaining brew. The special effects range from impressive to Gumby (with wings), there's a serialized mystery, and the assorted crushes among members of the team researching the "dinosaurs among us" threat at times make the whole thing feel like "Piccadilly Place." Still, the sci-fi yarn is breezy enough to fill the void left pretty much since "The X-Files" signed off. And as a bonus, kids will enjoy seeing dinosaurs tear up schools and other modern dwellings. …
9 p.m. Saturday. BBC America.
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They've coasted on too many "hot" actors and have wasted the premise to a large extent. Still mildly watchable.
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I don't know why, but with the exceptions of BSG and Doctor Who, sci-fi shows just totally blow goats.
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So, so bad.
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It's not bad at all, just very British. More self-mocking, less spun and "Smaller" than a lot of American product. Characterisation is a touch patchy and the plot develops nicely, if slowly, especially ep 6 onward.
Overall worth watching, but worth remembering what it is. -
It can be entertaining in a cheesy, silly sort of way, and the mystery of Nick's wife is intriguing for couple of episodes, but most of the series' time is wasted on repetitive monster of the week crap. And the creatures are so unbelievably, ludicrously aggressive. They will try to eat humans no matter what, even if it means certain death for them. Abby Maitland is cute though.
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Over here in the UK? How did the BBC get it's mits on it? I never watched a single episode though so I could be wrong, but I thought it was ITV's answer to DR Who?
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Or Channel 3 to our american cousins. It was made as a response to Doctor Who being so successful on the rival BBC1. I haven't watched it myself, but apparently it's okay, more family orientated. Abby (if it's Hannah Sperritt from SClub7) apparently appears more than a few times in her undies for random reasons.
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At that point they pretty much gave up taking it seriously and it really became quite fun towards the end of series 1 (although I understand they are running the 2 series together in the US?). The first review at the top had it pretty much right.
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...on ITV in the UK. Like many of the reviews i also hated it to start with. But the characters grow on you and a half descent conspiratorial arch develops throughout both series. First series manages to remain very mediocre, but then has a great finale with a clever, unexpected twist.
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And as DC Films alludes to there is quite a neat feeling in ambling along with a half decent series and then someone throws in a great twist.
I sense people trying to do their best with what is basically saturday night family tv, so kudos for that. Creature of the week is however getting tired really quickly so they need to rethink that piece. -
The first series was not good, the second managed to actually be worse, but still they persist and will foist series 3 on us soon. Good actors wasting their time and talent on bad writing and piss poor sfx. Avoid.
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that just shows you how shite we are at TV now.
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Primeval has a bit more camp to it and it doesn't take itself all that seriously. But it also has a nice background story developing throughtout the second series. One of the few things the show does however, is take liberties with its characters. I think the writing got a little better in the second series and not every monster that came through was carnivorous, but there was also something. Not sure how you would do show without the monsters.
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...forcing shows shown on other TV channels in the UK to be grouped under the BBC banner for screening and DVD distribution in the US.
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...when the implications of messing with time become clear. The second season carried this theme on to great effect. The show is worth persevering with.
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at least give them props for trying. yes this series isn't perfect, but bbca brings us gems like Jekyl, Dr Who, etc.
PRIMEVAL isn't great but its as good as scifi's offerings or better. -
The first few are very much cheesy monster of the week. Definitely worth checking out though. I bought the DVDs on line a long time ago. The joys of region-free DVD players. My wife really loves the show, but she is not that hot on Dr Who.
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Second season had some cool moments.
Second season ended on an interesting idea, which I thought I saw coming since the beginning.
Hey they get their own toy line.
Bonekickers is interesting starts a bit slow but grows nicely.
But the real treat is Australias The Hollowmen. -
The undie scenes are very nice.
And the cleavage of mystery wife is simply awesome. -
Hannah Spearitt is in her undies quite a lot so overall it's quite entertaining. But it's pretty second tier drama, roughly along the lines of Eureka or Stargate in terms of depth, so if you can enjoy those shows, this should be fairly watchable.
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This was ITV's answer to Dr Who.and as other's have posted ..it's been going for several seasons in Brit .More or less every week , a portal type ,space time rift thingy...lets a prehistoric monster or monsters through, and it goes on a rampage n what looks like a back street in Dartford , or Bluewater shopping centre .Week in week out.It's like Ground Hog day in its repetition!The producer of this, gave us the wonderful *Walking with Dinosaurs*,which unlike the JP series , managed to show Dinosaurs as living animals ,rather than fantasy monsters.He's lost the plot here.Also back from Walking with Dino's are the FX peaple *Framestore* These guys are GB's answer to ILM and have done some very good stuff in the past {mostly for miniseries and the Harry Potter films}Their CGI animation is usually first rate.Bute in this series it looks like they were , either rushed or stretched beyond their limits , because the CGI is pretty bad.The second season of this show , changed the format a bit so that more obviously fantasy creatures /Aliens could turn up {thus making the Dr Who Rip ...a bit more obvious...It's like the BBC didn't sue them...so they pushed their luck a bit further!}
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The first season of Primeval was so much better than the horrid first season of Torchwood. While the second season of Torchwood got a lot better Primeval didn't really get any better. It is full of things that make any fan of time travel stories bang their head in frustration. They bring up "we can't kill anything because it might change the timeline" once or twice and then go ahead and kill stuff with abandon and never bother with it. There's also of course the fact that these magical time holes are only happening in the UK. However, the cgi is pretty good for a television show and especially when UK scifi shows are known for horribly lame special effects. The cgi is better than any "Scifi channel original" movie I've seen.
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Season 2 ender proved that.
But you saw it coming at the end of season one.
Season two wasn't all that bad. Sometimes it limped but what doesn't?
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It's a good series, but I thought we all reviewed this a couple of years ago?
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didn't watch any more. Utterly awful. Doctor Who rival MY ARSE.
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It's terribly low budget, with some absolutely horrible CG at times. The writing is terrible, it's really just a show made to fill air time and reach some demographic.
It makes no sense: these people are going to fight unknown menaces that come through time worm holes, and they go to it mostly without any weapons or protective gear. Obviously, they are actually qualified, or capable of dealing with the situation, it's very unrealistically. (This is especially obvious in the first episode of season 2, in a shopping mall) Appears to be made for kids or young teenagers. It's a little bit like sunday morning a cartoon.
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thank you Hollywood Reporter for taking yet another headfirst dive into the empty pool of irrelevancy!
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They go by the book- or some rulebook anyway of marks to hit but when you think about it for more than a second it's just daft.
That guy who is like his assistant or something- works at a uni- all of a sudden and without any warning he's action man all guns and bravery. Maybe the teachers assistant job was a causing machismo buildup or somthing. Then they all get guns. In Britain!
Havent watched the 2nd season yet but it kind of makes you keep watching even though it's crap. You kind of watch it like you watch a toddler doing something lame then smile cos you feel superior! -
CGI is kinda crappy, but I've seen far far worse.
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I enjoyed it a lot. And has anyone mentioned that Hannah Spearitt spends a lot of time running around in her underwear? Because someone should mention that fact.
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Is it just me or does Primeval do what a lot of shows try to avoid? Creature CG in broad daylight?
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Lucy Brown's in this! She's fucking GORGEOUS!
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must show the shitness of it
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IT'S SHITE.
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Yuck!
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And lamentably failing. It is absolutely crap and shouldn't have survived 6 episodes.
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Make Shite. And I'm from Ireland were we have RTÉ. They make shite also,but UTV makes utter shite/
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The main guy went on the radio and said it was far superior than doctor who in story and special effects! HAHA
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PRIMEVAL sounded sort of interesting ... until I saw how they handled it. Dinosaurs playing tiddly winks with cars in a mall parking lot? A T-Rex equivalent sticking its head through a suburban home window? Yet the government feels it can - and should - cover this up? What the *$&%??? That's only mildly less idiotic than if the 1940 British government had decided they needed to hide the fact that the German air force was bombing the crap out of London every night.
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It does get a bit better though. I only ever saw some of the later stuff and was pleasantly surprised by the effects in the desert-bug episode in season 2.
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and every episode I watched was dog shit and made me ashamed to be British.
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I agree it's cheesy, but for some reason, it still has appeal. The 4th episode of the 2nd season was the most entertaining one. i was totally sucked in. and stoned.
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It's the kind of guilty pleasure harmless silly fun that Sci Fi channel shows try to be but fail at. Lucy Brown is a joy to watch too.
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Firstly, you must bear in mind that this is made for a family audience; Mum, Dad and Kids. If offers something for all the family: Hannah Spearitt in undies for Dad, James Murray as an action hunk for Mum, GCI dinos tearing shit up for the kids and a hokey sci-fi-lite storyline for all.
The general consensus here is about right; not amazing, but good enough to keep you watching. Young kids will absolutely love it. The last episode of series one has a great twist / cliff-hanger that the writers absolutely fail to develop in series two. In fact, it's like they write themselves into corner. The viewer is left thinking 'Wow, how are they gonna get out of that?', the unfortunate answer being with a massively disappointing cheat.
Series two also disappoints with the treatment of Lucy Brown, whose amazing knockers resemble a dead heat in a zeppelin race. When her character transforms from prim to vamp (via the writing cheat mentioned above) it should be wh-hay! time for dads. Sadly, her post transformation make-up and wardrobe appear to be handled by Elton John's mad uncle. Damn you, ITV!
The show does get some things right. Some of the set pieces are genuinely exciting, some of the dialogue is genuinely witty and episode 6 of series two (the one with the mammoth) is a cracker.
If you've got young kids and low expectations, you could do far worse.
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I meant
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I noticed a few people complaining about the monster of the week format, but wondering what else they could do.
I always wondered, if they are random portals in time why do they only go millions of years into the past when monsters ruled the world, or millions of years into the future when monsters ruled the world?
Surely they could have the odd one that went to the time of the crusades or something, or even to next week. -
...and not taking itself seriously at all, so in fact i liked it a lot (both seasons were already shown in germany).Some scenes are really scary, f.e. an - of course unoriginal but still - very dangerous and fast looking velociraptor in a shopping mall.xwoof, Lucy Brown's strange clothing and disturbing appearance may have a certain reason, because she appears to having been pregnant when shooting. Still her new character is trash of the unfunny, stupid kind and all the good ideas of the season 1 finale are wasted. Still the series is more fun than, say, the one with the two brothers chasing the ghost of the week, which i already forgot the name of...
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Terrible acting, unbelievable story lines, but hey its fun and Hannah Spearitt is cute.
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It just keeps piling on the bad too, the second series made me wish I was blind, deaf and dumber.
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I agree with the minority of talkbackers that this show is a guilty pleasure. No, the acting isn't first-rate but so what? I do sometimes get annoyed at how the characters are protrayes as being clueless and lacking in all common sense but the ride is quite fun and I enjoy it. I have already seen series 1 and 2 (and will buy the DVD's when I can) as well as being excited about series 3 (which is in production, or so I'm told).
All in all, a very watchable show bearing absolutely NO resemblance to Dr. Who (can't imagine the RETARD that made that association). -
...the Sci-Fi Channel! Seriously, this is Flash Gordon series-level bad. Auntie Beeb's getting on in years and has lost her sense of aesthetics, I suppose.
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It would be nice if they got past the dinosaurs and dinosaurs from the future and did some humans or at least mammals. It would be really interesting if they did something like the Torchwood episode where the plane of people came from the past but Primeval wouldn't be so grim and serious and busy telling you just how grim and serious they were like every episode of Torchwood.
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I could use a few good lizard baby birth scenes. And a touch of Reagan era foreign policy propaganda.
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