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jemck at 09:23am on 03/11/2008
jemck at 09:23am on 03/11/2008One thing we did over the half term was catch up on a few backed-up episodes of the BBC's new Camelot:The High School Years , Swords'n'Smallville, Merlin. We are now up to speed and looking forward to next week!
We were moderately hopefuly from the outset. It passed the Knitted String Test for a start. To recap, we have found fantasy films and TV that have decent armour are usually markedly better than ones who think knitted string sprayed silver suffices. It doesn't, and the scripts don't tend to either. (Yes, Robin Hood, I'm looking at you...)
Anyway, back to Merlin, we're definitely enjoying it. Decent performances from the youthful leads plus solid support from selected great British thespians, eg Richard Wilson, Anthony Head. Also guest stars proving well worthy of their hire - Santiago Cabrera, Kenneth Cranham. Good production values all round, not just with the chain mail, including satisfactory CGI. Solid family entertainment.
Does that all sound a bit faint praise? It shouldn't. No, it's not setting the world on fire but hey, it's decent high fantasy on the telly! That's worth cheering of itself. So, yay!
Even if the only way they can do this is by hanging it on the tiresomeness that is the Arthurian Cycle. I'll spare you all my reasons for disliking such rehashes. Suffice it to say that I quite agreed when husband observed 'this is the first Arthurian thing in ages that hasn't just pissed me off inside ten minutes.' *
There are nice nods to the myth as we all know it will unfold but they're not hung up on all that. Similarly, while there are nods to the various historical and folkloric theories on the roots of the myth, they're happy to crack on with the anachronistic armour and castle and whatever and just tell entertaining tales of knights and monsters and devious sorcery. While seasoning it all with an underpinning of untold depths - just why is Uther soooo anti-sorcery? Looking forward to finding out!
(* husband went on to observe 'and it's more believable than Bonekickers'. That really was tosh, wasn't it? And not in a good way. Any telly series that has our 12 year old accurately predicting the Big Secret Reveal in the Last Episode - by the end of Ep.1 of 6 really is in trouble.)
We were moderately hopefuly from the outset. It passed the Knitted String Test for a start. To recap, we have found fantasy films and TV that have decent armour are usually markedly better than ones who think knitted string sprayed silver suffices. It doesn't, and the scripts don't tend to either. (Yes, Robin Hood, I'm looking at you...)
Anyway, back to Merlin, we're definitely enjoying it. Decent performances from the youthful leads plus solid support from selected great British thespians, eg Richard Wilson, Anthony Head. Also guest stars proving well worthy of their hire - Santiago Cabrera, Kenneth Cranham. Good production values all round, not just with the chain mail, including satisfactory CGI. Solid family entertainment.
Does that all sound a bit faint praise? It shouldn't. No, it's not setting the world on fire but hey, it's decent high fantasy on the telly! That's worth cheering of itself. So, yay!
Even if the only way they can do this is by hanging it on the tiresomeness that is the Arthurian Cycle. I'll spare you all my reasons for disliking such rehashes. Suffice it to say that I quite agreed when husband observed 'this is the first Arthurian thing in ages that hasn't just pissed me off inside ten minutes.' *
There are nice nods to the myth as we all know it will unfold but they're not hung up on all that. Similarly, while there are nods to the various historical and folkloric theories on the roots of the myth, they're happy to crack on with the anachronistic armour and castle and whatever and just tell entertaining tales of knights and monsters and devious sorcery. While seasoning it all with an underpinning of untold depths - just why is Uther soooo anti-sorcery? Looking forward to finding out!
(* husband went on to observe 'and it's more believable than Bonekickers'. That really was tosh, wasn't it? And not in a good way. Any telly series that has our 12 year old accurately predicting the Big Secret Reveal in the Last Episode - by the end of Ep.1 of 6 really is in trouble.)
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