Brutal Review of 12 Monkeys TV Series

I was looking forward to this!

Now, I am not so sure.

At first, I started reading this article, sure that the author was going to blast the movie, which was one of the most brilliant movies that I have ever seen, bar none. I love everything about the movie: the mind bending ramifications of the story, the exciting plot, the acting that makes the characters feel real, as well as the general weirdness of much of the movie. This author goes so far as to say what I have long felt, but never dared say: this was Bruce Willis's best acting performance.

So, I had high hopes for the television series.

Those hopes took a serious blow while reading this article, however. That is precisely because he acknowledges how great the film was, and just how badly the television series apparently fails (at least the series opener).

Is it a companion piece to the film? According to the author here, hardly. In fact, it is so mindless, according to him, that "this plodding, humorless time-filler doesn't earn right of comparison to Quantum Leap."

Ouch!

Tell us how you really feel!

Now, let me just say this: I still intend to watch it. But I remember that it is the SyFy network and, let's be frank here, some of their shows and movies are laughably bad! This could be an ongoing series, but whether it compares with the movie is almost a laughable notion now, I guess.

Very few movies are as good, as bold and daring, as artistic, and as ultimately gripping as 12 Monkeys. Maybe it was unrealistic to think that a tv show - especially one on SyFy, could actually measure up to the movie, or come within the same neighborhood.

Still, I had higher hopes for it then this. I watched the first nine minutes of the premier episode and, frankly, it is hard not to draw the same conclusions as Chuck Bowen did in this review. It looks bad.

Nonetheless, the series premiere airs this Friday evening at 9pm, and will replay numerous times later that night, and all throughout Saturday. I will still give the whole episode a shot, and see what my own impressions are.

If that is going to be the case, the film deserves better. It was a brilliant and original work that forces the viewer to really think about things. Here is the review of it by Siskel and Ebert back in 1995, and they both liked the movie so much that they each saw it twice to understand it better!



Hopefully, the series will be good enough to watch more than once. But seeing the first 9 minutes, it does not seem like a certain thing.



12 Monkeys: Season One  1 out of 4 BY CHUCK BOWEN ON JANUARY 8, 2015

http://www.slantmagazine.com/tv/review/12-monkeys-season-one