Never have I seen a show change so drastically from a preview to actual premier. A few weeks ago, when they first began advertising for the new Bionic Woman TV series, I caught a video ad on the Internet.
It looked good. Dramatic. She had home issues with a little sister who was deaf and resents her and a crappy job at a bar. She’s a college drop-out. Her boyfriend is secretly working for the government or something on this bionic program and he’s a brilliant sugreon and professor - which makes her wonder why he’s interested. There is a powerful enemy - the first bionic woman (in the gummint program, not from the first series) and hurdles she’s got to get over.
None of these things are secrret (no real spoilers) because they right there in the commercial.
However, most of it changed.
The entire deaf sister subplot was dropped. Apparently deaf people were pissed because the actor was not actually deaf. She was (GASP!) acting . So they got a different actor and just made her annoying and bitter.
They also apparently got rid of the actor who originally played the enemy, because I swear it was not Jamie Bamber I saw in the original advert. And, hey, cool, Bamber is well known, good looking and popular, but didn’t that other person deserve a shot at fame? (And the Chief makes an appearance, too. Did Battlestar get cancelled?)
So I’m wondering if they reshot half the episode just in the past couple weeks for no good reason. It was really strange to watch because it was not at all what I was expecting.
Oh, and just how does the addition of bionic limbs make one a martial arts expert over night?
I thought it had potential, but it lacked urgency. They tried to put some urgency into it, but all the scenes with Jaime Sommers seemed to me to be quite a lot less exciting than the scenes with Sarah Corvus. I blame editing and directing, rather than acting. I think it will improve, if the ratings let it run.
Good to see Miguel Ferrer again.
I didn’t see Jamie Bamber anywhere, which one was he?
I thought the actress playing Jamie was horrible. There’s no way I’d want to watch her as a main character of the series. She’s more appropriate for a side character who gets killed off after one episode. Her single facial expression makes her look like she’s smelling something funny.
Hey, just be glad they gave her TWO bionic legs. In the original series, she only had ONE bionic leg, which any idiot knows would make her very, very quick…at running in circles.
Remember after the knife fight in the ally, she went to doc boyfriend’s house and said she almost killed a man and she didn’t even know why. He told her that his dad had developed micro chips that went on her cerebral cortex to enhance her combat skills. The bionic technology is all tied to a kind of supper solider program.
My question is did anyone see what was written in red when they shifted to Bionic Sight tm? When she was looking at people small amounts of info showed in the box by their head, and I couldn’t make it out on my TV. Most people showed in a off white yellow writing but bionic Starbuck and knife guy both had their writing in red.
Didn’t the scientist boyfriend also say that they had put some implants in her cerebral cortext to make her a soldier? I’m paraphrasing, but he did say that something had been put in her brain along with the other bionic implants. That would account for the martial arts knowledge, at least for the purposes of the show. I don’t think too much hard science can be reasonably applied here, or the whole thing falls apart.
I liked seeing Katee Sackhoff looking hot and badass, but the rest of it was just kind of eh. I was massively disappointed that there wasn’t any cool sound effect when she was using her bionic powers. I was really looking forward to that.
I must admit that I appreciated Sarah Corvus better as a character (better name, too!), but I’m hoping that Jamie will come along. Of course, I probably will never watch it again, because I just don’t watch TV much.
There don’t seem to be any characters with any depth in this thing…
When the only watchable character is a show is the villain, that show is doomed to a quick death.
I agree with the others here. Jaime is played by an actress so bad that the only other part on tv she could get would be an assistant DA to Sam Waterston on Law & Order. I was turned off every time they did a close up of her face, which was about once every minute. Everything about the plot and set-up just screamed stupid.
It might get better when they don’t have to cram as much stupid into a single episode, but I won’t know because I won’t be watching.
That caused me a lot of dissonance, as I read about the deaf sister in a review published Wednesday. So, when we first met li’l sis blasting her stereo, I thought that she, like some deaf friends in the past, was blasting the music to feel the vibrations. But then Jaime starts talking to her through the bedroom door, and I’m like, WTF?
But anyway, I give BW a massive “meh”. Nothing hugely wrong with it, but absolutely nothing to make me watch a second time.
And her boyfriend’s dad played a prominent role in BSG as Baltar’s defense attorney. I’m wondering if this show will be like playing spot the BSG folk.
I give it a ‘meh’ and I’ll probably see another half dozen episodes to see if it improves.
