Bionic Woman

Unless you took some hype for the show, the premiere was as good as you can get. Some of you make this sound worse then the "bionic dog" they had back in the old school. Oh but it's not. Watch it closely. Acting was good... to an extent. She was great but the babysitter job over the sister took a lot of time and might bring the drama to a halt, but the storyline itself shocked me. I was waiting for a disaster and now I want to see it run, well see her run.. AND thank god it's fast because if I heard that slow motion "speed and strength" sound fx I would of ripped my DVR from the wall. But overall, she is a beautiful actress with some nicely played attitude at the end which, if sticks, will guarantee a hit. I say give it a chance and it will be GREAT success. There is a lot of competition out there so they do need to slot it right. They can't run it during House, Hero's, Prison Break, or any other top drama (Don't forget Dexter!!!). Wow I waste a lot of time but helps me work at night since there is about 15 other shows too. But this one will make my list and time demands me to be a critic.

I think this "re-make" can be summed up in one observation: the premier episode was just an hour. Therefore, it was just another episode. Problem is, you can't lay the foundation for what is obviously supposed to be a blockbuster series in just one hour. Much less a re-make that is marketed to draw in everybody over the age of 40 who watched the original "Bionic Woman" and "The Six Million Dollar Man."

As a member of that demographic, I was left very much wanting. The premier was basically a "wham, bam, thank you, m'am" undertaking. It was like the producers were going down a checklist:

Introduce Jamie Sommers - check. Have her dating Rudy Wells - HUH?!? Show her catastrophic accident - check. Give her her bionics - check. Show her shocked reaction - check. Show her anger at what happened to her - check. Make her an OSI agent - check. Run closing credits - check.

Heck, they probably had ten minutes left over when they finished the list, which would explain the obligatory (for this day & age) bedroom scene. And that's indicative of how much the new writers care about the original show.

If they want to attract and hold those of us who were fans of the original as kids, why not acknowledge that history? Give this Bionic Woman a different name, have her learn that bionics have been around for over thirty years, and that Steve Austin and Jamie Sommers were the patriarch and matriarch of the cyborg community. Make it "Bionic Woman: The Next Generation". That would dovetail a lot better with Katie Sackhoff's character of "Bionic Woman Gone Bad".

Be bold. Be creative. Give hardcore BW fans something to sink their teeth into.

But no. All we have is, as another commenter coined, a "cookie-cutter" hybrid of other "super woman" genres of recent vintage. Basically, "BWINO" - Bionic Woman In Name Only.

I'll probably give it a chance for a while - if I remember it's on.

I loved the idea of this remake and I think the actress is good enough to do it. But I am left feeling very disappointed.

It is almost like the writer had a list of cliché ideas next to him and ticked them off one by one. The whole 1st episode is infected with old ideas.

The one thing that really annoyed me was the mis-timed pace of it. One minute she is with her sis and the next she is having a pointless fight on a roof.

There was no time taken at all to develop her character and show the bionic transformation. This just seemed to be an inconvenience and got in the way of the first fight scene. It is almost like this programme is targeted for the Playstation Nation who are too impatient to sit down and watch a story build so it just whizzes past anything of substance.

Too fast, too cliché and nothing new here at all. Pity. I am struggling to recommend this.

Firstly and foremost, I have to point out that I am a big fan of the new Galactica, although I don't personally see why that should apply to the reception of a separate show. And yes, I know there are considerable crossovers in writing and acting talent, but the show still deserves to be evaluated on its own.

Secondly, rose-tinted memories aside, remember that old seventies shows have not generally stood the test of time. They were strictly formulaic, beset by comedy fashion and hairstyle, and the bionic woman itself was a cheap knock off of its masculine origin show. For God's sake, they varied the implants just so she would be different to Steve Austin.

Of course, restrictions of formula still apply. An audience that has been gobbling up 24, Lost and Prison Break for the last few years now has higher expectations of a new show. Better production values, more stylised dialogue and a greater sense of mythology pervade these shows. And Heroes has pushed the benchmark out about as far as it can go.

So any new pilot on any network is going to come under serious scrutiny. And I think Bionic Woman holds up. I will concede that the script for the pilot was a little ropey - I had the distinct feeling a pilot movie script had been seriously hacked down to size. But the performances were strong enough to hold it, and the photography and visual design showed some innovation.

The biggest problem with series (as opposed to movies) is that it can take much longer for a show to build up the momentum it needs to create its identity. The Bionic Woman had always been a family show, just like The Six Million Dollar Man. If the new Bionic Woman is going to establish itself as the same, then it will have to pitched just right.

So it gets six out of ten. Better than average. Better than a lot of shows that somehow continue, but worse than many who have fallen by the wayside. Lets just hope that NBC give Jamie Summers time to show us who she really is.

Whether it's a hit or not, for me it has already wiped another laughable 70s show off the map. Maybe they could update The Fall Guy, only it would be about a CGI artist who used his power of computer graphics to help a different woman every week...

OK first things first..Michelle Ryan looks the part, seems likable and is attractive...however there is some depth missing in her performance. The premise is modern, or maybe typical is a better word, as this time around Jaime Sommers works as a bartender, yes a bartender. Gone is the high school teacher / tennis player. Maybe that was too 70's. Also gone are Rudy Wells and Oscar Goldman. However Rudy does have a cameo of sorts as Jaime's middle name is said to be Wells in the episode...Hmm maybe Rudy will show up. This Jaime takes care of her troublesome kid sister ( is there any other kind on these shows )is engaged and about to possibly marry her professor boyfriend and we find all this out within the first 10 minutes when....well here is where circumstances cause her to become, the Bionic Woman. Here is my problem with this version. Its dark, brooding, and comes across as Spiderman meets Alias meets X-Men. And half the show appears to be a night. Can I get some daylight please!!!! And the sister is an annoying addition and unnecessary. Another head scratcher is that after finding out what she is now...there wasn't much delving into her discovering and acceptance of her current state. The woman goes straight back to work serving drinks for god sakes like she just had a boob job and that was it and oh well back to work. Maybe this new Jaime is OK for the new generation but I don't find it appealing in its present incarnation. Maybe its the times we live in but almost every show I see on TV is dark, brooding and depressing. The bionic woman of the 70's was about adventure and action and a touch of tongue and cheek. This version is about violence, death, hit men, and dark depressing characters with ulterior motives. Yes there is action in it too but it all comes with all the extras above. Give me Lindsay and the fembots any day!!!! One good thing about this version I will say is they spruced up on how they show and deal with Jaime's speed. It doesn't come across silly or anything. Sadly Alias, aside from the superhuman strength, has already charted these waters of the beautiful babe with kickass fighting abilities. Been there done that. They should have just gone the way of an adventure/action show and maybe, just maybe...then again who knows...Dark , brooding, depressing seems to be the in thing these days.