Reviews

I was hoping for a bit of wit or something in the production to lift this BBC series above the level of soap opera. Not there.

TO be fair, I have not been an avid viewer. I saw the first episode of season one, and just this evening checked in by watching the first episode of season 2. All on American PBS. BBC soap opera becomes tote-bag opera on Public Broadcasting.

The acting skills of Sir Derek and a few of the others do their best to elevate this above the basic plot points of who sleeps with whom. But not by much. Extended family melodrama, really. If this were an American "Dallas" or "Dynasty" storyline it would be the widowed matriarch of one family marrying the widowed patriarch of another. Their grown kids have twisted pasts, mostly involving secret affairs, pregnancies, adultery and tangled alliances. Take away the obscene wealth and glitter, change the accents and scenery and you have "Last Tango in Halifax."

You take 3 parts Indiana Jones, 2 parts Harry Potter. For a leading man, star a young TV veteran from a hit melodrama of the last decade. In each installment cast an affordable exotic beauty in her late 30's. For a villain, cast a recognizable but unnameable TV actor from the last century. Leaven with 2 aging but able sitcom stars of the 1980's. Cook with just enough sex and violence to pass basic cable standards, but no bad language, so reruns can occur on broadcast TV on weekend afternoons when there is no sports game.

As I write, this, the third installment of the Librarian, is up in a 6 hour marathon of the trilogy on a Turner station. It is not bad for a lazy Sunday afternoon, if you have other things to do indoors to distract you.

As many have already noticed, it is a blatant riff or rip-off of the Indiana Jones franchise, except set in today's world. Noah Wylie wears Indy clothes and works for a "library" that is much like Indy's museum. Except the Library has not only a collection of fantasy icons from the past (from the bible to King Arthur to Grimm tales) but also wizard-like magic straight from Harry Potter. Noah is sent on a major quest in each episode, with magic-wielding villains to overcome and a sexy babe as his companion.

This third one is the darkest, I suppose, what with vampires in New Orleans (where did they come up with that, I wonder?) and Russian mafia types. Unlike Spielberg and his big-time budget, the special effects here are pretty cheesy computer graphics. The smaller the screen, the better they look.

I read that a basic cable series (hour-long format) is in the works for The Librarian franchise. Noah Wylie makes an appearance here and there. But younger actors do the heavy lifting, and apparently John Larroquette takes over the aging sitcom star duties.

Having said all that, it isn't all that bad, as long as you aren't after real thrills, real drama, or real comedy. It is passable eye-candy and decent time-filler for shut-ins on a rainy day. Nothing too gory or scary for youngsters beyond the first grade. And nothing too sexy to embarrass your grandma who may be baby-sitting. Just clever enough and good-looking enough to keep from reaching for the remote.

In short -- just what the TNT production committee ordered!

This is a dandy example of one of the better Simpsons episodes. I give it a ten.

Lisa takes the fore in this one, doing some Nancy Drew style detective work looking for clues to the history of Springfield.

A bit of trivia: Donald Sutherland, guest star of this episode, once portrayed a character named Homer Simpson. That Homer Simpson was a frustrated and doomed everyman in the film, The Day of the Locust (1975) based on the 1939 Nathaniel West novel of the same name.

No apparent relation to our cartoon dimwit, though only Matt Groening would know for sure. The Day of the Locust is considered a seminal American novel. According to Wikipedia, Groening says in a 1990 interview he got the name for his Homer from that book/film. But then again, Matt's own father was named "Homer" too.