I caught the first half of the pilot for "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles" last night, and I have to admit I was impressed. "Terminator" seems built for the small screen - if the plot gets bogged down, just bring in another Terminator from the future - but I was more impressed how well the show was put together. Lena Headley's gotten a lot of press as the lead in the show, and she's just as good as everyone expected she would be. But my heart remains with the lovely Summer Glau, already adored by "Firefly" fans as the tortured government project capable of killing people with roundhouse kicks. Like Chuck Norris with amnesia after ten years of ballet. She's just as good here as John Connor's protective Terminator, adding indestructibility and, y'know, being a robot, to her arsenal of graceful kung-fu, but she hangs onto that cautious sincerity that sold millions of sci-fi fans on her years ago.
It's still up in the air if the show'll deliver on its promise as the weeks continue - people running away can get old quick, and so I'm still up in the air whether it'll be the 1963 version of "The Fugitive," or the 2000 version - but David Nutter directed a whiz-bang pilot. The creators keep throwing in a potpourri of different film stocks, up to and including Super-8 footage, and always keep the pace moving at an amphetamine-rush pace. It's not groundbreaking (but then, this is television), but it feels fresh and stays exciting and most importantly, fun. And it gives us the real possibility of a robot-human love story in the weeks ahead, which is worth turning your TV on for (at least, it is for me). The pilot's available at Fox if you want to check it out.
In other news, In The Name of the King has dropped to 3% on Rotten Tomatoes, making it one of the Top 15 Worst Movies Of All Time. The sole good review for the film notes "Boll manages to hold this disaster in the making together by infusing it with unexpected energy." It is a bad sign when the single best review for your film calls it a disaster. A very bad sign.