Taken -- Alien Post-Mortem (mild spoilers)

Cafe Society
1

OK, SciFi Channel has finally finished its premiere of Taken and is now lowering its already abysmal level of quality programming by rerunning it continuously. Is anyone else besides me irritated at just how little they managed to add to the basic alien abduction mythos?

As near as I could tell, they added nothing to the story we’d already heard a million times already. Roswell crash? Check. Alien abductees? Check. Alien-human hybrid? Check. Sociopathic government scientists and paranoid generals? Check.

The amazing revelation at the heart of it all? “Tell us about this human emotion you call LUV!”. Check. The final cliched encounter between the sweet and innocent abductees and the eeevil government agents, with the Deus Ex Machina of the saucers coming down. Check. Blend in Roswell, Star Trek, a bit of ET and Starman and you could dig for weeks and not unearth a scrap of originality.

There was, admittedly, some good acting (notably, that gleefully creepy scientist who was humping the sociopathic female scientist), but there was some pretty wooden acting too.

My bottom line review -- pretty much a 20 hour mediocre Outer Limits episode.
2

I ranted about being “Taken” for a ride in the Pit. I thought this mini-series was absolute dreck, and I totally agree with you about the lack of originality. I further suspect that it is merely a set-up, a really long pilot for some future series.

Cute kid that will be coming back? Check
A good guy couple ready to be chased by the bad guys? Check
Unresolved plot lines to untangle? Check

I could go on but what’s the point? I’m mad at myself for wasting the time watching it.

3

What supprised me was that a couple of the episodes were very similar to the short lived “Dark Skies” series (the main actor from which was in Taken)

4

And a number of the plot motifs (as well as actors) were used on “The X Files”… human/alien hybrids, military/government coverups, characters who holds others at gunpoint, a character who can heal wounds with a touch, main characters getting together and producing a child the aforementioned government wants… I could go on and on.

Seems to me the filmmakers just said, “Spielberg has given us a boatload of money, let’s milk it for all it’s worth.”

5

Overall I thought it was pretty good. Altho, the end was a bit too sappy for my taste. I liked Matt Frewer’s character the best (aka the creepy scientist.) He had an interesting way of explaning things.