Terra Nova

[The Veteran]

Ok, I've just watched the first two episodes of new series Terra Nova on Sky 1 tonight and was wondering if anyone else had. I saw the adverts for this show and it seemed pretty hyped up with some nice shots of dinosaurs and comparisons to Jurassic Park. It was inevitable that I'd end up watching it to be honest...

 

Now my Latin is a little rusty but I think it's a safe bet to say Terra Nova translates to New Earth, a very fitting name for this series. Basically it's the 22nd century and things have gone downhill fast with the planet said to be dying. The air is barely breathable and as far as I can tell from these first episodes there only seems to be one major community remaining. Presumably there are others but we certainly don't see them, the only one illustrated being a very Mega Primus sort of affair.

 

Now it seems the solution to the planet dying is as simple as building a time machine for our future brethren and so that's what they do! A probe is sent into the past to determine if the new wormhole is stable and what time and location they have reached but it is never rediscovered in the future. This is apparently because it's very presence has created an alternate timeline so that the original 'dying earth' timeline cannot be affected by the colonists actions.

 

Obviously colonists mean a colony and that means Terra Nova. 10 'pilgrimages' have been sent into the past in order to establish and expand a new base of operations for the human race, it seems professional trades are in higher demand and so many of the colonists are essentially chosen based on talent.

 

Moving a little deeper into the story, it seems that when the 6th pilgrimage travelled back in time they were mostly members of some sort of splinter group with very different plans to the rest of the colonists. When they realise they've been rumbled they pack up a whole bunch of equipment and weapons and then bolt from Terra Nova to set up a new camp of their own. From here they continue to harass the original settlement it seems.

 

This is pretty much all there is to say about the story, so now it's time for some personal observations about this new series. Sadly I'm not impressed... [be warned that spoilers MAY follow from this point and I will not be editing them out!]

 

Right from the start of the film, character development was very predictable and I'm confident that I already understand the roles of 90% of the cast for at least the first season of this show. There is the main family of the show who broke the law in the future by having a third child and they comprise of fairly standard roles. Mum is a respected doctor who was invited to join the colony. Dad was jailed 2 years earlier due to the third child but is broken out just in time to smuggle himself and said child through the wormhole. The moody teenage son is rebelling against Dad for being in prison and has had to leave his girlfriend behind. No surprise when he immediately meets a friendly girl in Terra Nova. The good girl sister also instantly hits it off with a soldier boy in the colony so all very predictable stuff in order to snowball the cast a little.

 

Visuals are fairly nice with some decent dino shots of herbivores eating near the camp but carnivores never look as good due to the 'shaky camera' so popular in monster movies that allows quicker, cheaper special effects and ultimately cheats the viewer.

 

Onto the Carnivores, I'll need a Dino boff to correct me here but I think the show has made up the main 'bad-guy' Dinos. The colonists call them 'Slashers' and they attack with their tails which I assume have some form of blade on them (though shaky camera syndrome makes it hard to discern...) There are also 2 points in these pilot episodes when the Slashers clearly get hold of colonists only to completely fail to kill or even seriously injure them. At one point a young girl is pulled from a vehicle by her leg (yes clutched in Dino-jaws) and then flailed around and crunched on for several moments before being dropped to the ground with a slightly bloody shin. I could bite someone and do more damage... Another girl is seen running through the forest alone before clearly being pounced by a Slasher yet later she turns up looking as if she has merely navigated a moderately dense patch of brambles.

 

All of this aside however there are still things in these early episodes that bug me more than the above. One of these involves a very Hatch-esque type storyline (LOST reference) which reveals something that people clearly know about but noone will explain or discuss until the series finale. I won't go into it as it may spoil the experience for others who plan to watch the show...

 

My big problem with this show so far though is another storyline very similar to LOST. Remember the 6th pilgrimage guys? Well they seem to be a constant thorn in the side of the Terra Nova bossman and I'm not sure why... During these episodes we hear that the eleventh pilgrimage could bring as many as 100 colonists, an awful lot according to the ensuing conversation. That means that previous pilgrimages have been smaller than this (although when we see the queue for the 10th pilgrimage in episode 1 I'd say there are at least 100 or more people in line) Anyway... My query to the creators, and also Terra Nova Bossman, is this...

 

If we assume each group had 100 colonists in it, that 10 groups have come through the wormhole to date, that half of pilgrimage 6 deserted, and that say 40% of all colonists have died since the project began (no serious death rates are mentioned but I'm trying to create the LEAST favourable conditions for my argument). Now that means that Terra Nova has approximately 570 personnel by now including well equipped security forces, a well-defended outer perimeter and all the prefab buildings you can shake a Stegosaurus at. The rebel camp meanwhile has around 50 people in it with some scavenged weapons and vehicles, no supply line, no pre-fabricated base for defences.

 

 

Now, there are several occasions on which the Terra Nova Bossman goes on about how he won't let these rebels ruin things for the colony and so on, but I would raise the point that he doesn't seem to really be that bothered... Indeed at one point in the show, 2 enemy vehicles (read : stolen from Terra Nova) with no more than 8 personnel inside actually drive right inside the Terra Nova camp. They are of course immediately surrounded by the good guys but despite this huge advantage and the chance to recover half a dozen weapons, 2 vehicles and eliminate a handful of enemies, the bossman simply gives them their prisoner back and also hands over food and medicine too. He doesn't even confiscate their weapons! This man is a fool.

 

 

Now bear in mind I've over estimated the number of personnel currently stationed in both Terra Nova AND the rebel camp but remember the latter is of course is dependant on how many colonists came through with Pilgrimage 6 and how many were bad-guys. That means that even if only 100 people have come through the wormhole so far, the rebels would still be vastly outnumber with as few as 10 men in their camp! In truth, Terra Nova does appear almost deserted given what we've seen so far so why on earth is the rebel band not simply annihilated? And how long can they defend themselves against the rampaging Dinos when they have no way to obtain new weapons and armour?

 

To make this bizarre situation even more inexplicable, it turns out the rebels are in control of some kind of ore mine which is highly valuable to the Terra Novians! When they enter the base with their demands of food and medicine they even use this ore to barter with. If it was me I'd have had them all killed, kept the vehicles, kept the ore, kept the weapons, and annihilated at least 20% of the enemy forces without a single friendly casualty.

 

So what am I missing? There's also further stupidity in this series which involves the stereotypical teenagers bunking off in a stolen jeep (smuggled out of the compound somehow) to make booze in the Slasher infested wilderness and jump in a waterfall miles from base. What kind of compound is built to keep dinosaurs out but doesn't think about keeping it's children in? It's made glaringly obvious that these kids come out to do this sort of stuff VERY frequently yet noone notices them stealing a vehicle, leaving the base, or going missing for hours at a time.

 

Long and the short of it, this could have been the best thing since Jurassic park but it's not... It looks really great and clearly has some pretty high production value, the writers should be utterly ashamed of themselves though and unless they make some pretty major improvements to this shows formula VERY soon I very much doubt there will be a season 2.

 

Rant over, discuss