Terra Nouveau, er Nova.

Yay, dinosaurs!

I know you were expecting a well-thought out blog post about whether the new television program Terra Nova is able to successfully explore its themes of redemption, isolationism, and family bonding, but instead you are getting: yay dinosaurs!

Oh, hai!

Seriously, I will put up with a lot to get me some dino action. Especially when there is chomping involved. Because ever since Jurassic Park came out in 1993 (dear god I am old), I have had a thing for dinosaurs and chomping.

Ok, fine, it's a tv blog so I will put forth a little more effort. But not a lot. Hence, quotage from wiki:

The show begins in the year 2149, a time when all life on planet Earth is threatened with extinction due to dwindling worldwide air quality and overpopulation. At Hope Plaza, a massive ring shaped structure in Chicago, scientists discover a rift in space-time that allows people to travel 85 million years back in time to the late Cretaceous period on the prehistoric Earth of an alternate reality, offering a chance to save humanity. The Shannon family (father Jim, his wife Elisabeth, and their three children Josh, Maddy, and Zoe) join the tenth pilgrimage of settlers to Terra Nova, the first human colony on the other side of the temporal doorway.

There's some interesting stuff here: for LOST fans there are mysterious man-made etchings outside the Terra Nova walls, there is a splinter colony that might or might not be up to no good, and the leader of Terra Nova, Commander Tyler, might or might not be telling everything he knows about this strange new/old world.

Sure, the family drama is your typical tv stuff (I really hate hate HATE the word "trope"), but the characters are all likable and the show even managed to make the "angry teen boy" and "nerdy cute teen girl" stuff relate to the overall plot. And did I mention?

DINOSAURS!

RAWR!

The two hour plot played more like a movie with impressive special effects, good set-up, and hints at mysteries and plots to come. There has been some general bitching about the quality of the dinosaurs, but this isn't Steven Spielberg people. Come on. And there is one scene involving some teens being terrorized by dinosaurs that was particularly well made and tense.

So it looks like there's another show for you to add to your list this fall. Man, I hope all you people have a DVR or you are really screwed.

Mr. and Mrs. Shannon, and Commander Tyler played by one of my favorite actors, Stephen Lang. You know him as the asshole military guy in Avatar. I know him as the asshole military guy in Gettysburg. While he plays a military guy on Terra Nova, he has not shown himself to be an asshole...yet.