BLUE MAG

Am I the only one who dutifully downloaded the 4 early NBC pilots from my Tivo via the Amazon Unbox service? I will be delighted to review them for you here, starting with “Bionic Woman.”

Honestly, this was not good. I’m not sure I’d watch this again. First of all, it moved way to fast. I don’t think the Bionic Woman should have full knowledge of her powers at the end of the pilot episode. It should be noted that I am not relying on any knowledge of the original series in my watching, as I have no memory of it. Maybe it makes sense in greater scheme of things for the show, and maybe there is a tie in to the original series there, but this pilot felt more like a midseason episode.

Some of the dialogue was flat, especially the parts written for the Bionic leading lady herself. She meets Sarah Corvus, the original bionic woman (played by Starbuck herself, Katee Sackhoff) and later tells this to her boyfriend by asking him “how does Sarah Corvus fit into all of this?” It sounds like a 2 year old who just learned a new word and shows off by using it all the time. And don’t even get me started about the scene that appeared in promos where the kid and her übermom are driving and see Sommers running by the side of the road, escaping, and the girl says “I just thought it was cool that a girl could do that.” Gaaah.

The effects for the most part highlighted how spectacular the effects are on “Battlestar Galactica.” Roughly the same production team was able to make what I think is the most realistic space FX ever (I am not much of a sci-fi guy, but that’s a pretty safe assertion, right?) but their bionical-person FX look bad. The super-fast running and super-far jumping look horrible, far worse than even “The Matrix.” The eye scanner effect is OK but doesn’t look as user-friendly (for the bionic person I mean) as the T-800’s scanner in “The Terminator.” They should have hired the guy who designed that interface.

There are some intriguing plot elements and characters, like the Dr. Anthros character, although he is apparently the boyfriend’s dad but looks roughly the same age. But overall this is a weak pilot and looks like a crappy show. Bring on Sarah Connor…