I liked it. I admit to catching the movie only because of Noah Wyle, but the movie caught me. It was fun, not taking itself too seriously, and the feature character is an unlikely hero, which is always worth watching. The name librarian is misleading since Noah Wyle's librarian character is more archaeologist and artifact keeper than librarian, probably why he's the librarian instead of a librarian, a different Jane Curtin will have you remembering.
The plot here is pretty basic. Geeky guy needs to save the world with beautiful woman to help him. She's the brawn; he's the brains. If you like fun little action-adventure movies, this is the kind of plot you're used to.
If you're looking for something different, don't look here. There's very little originality to bed had, but then again, since when did people start expect originality in a made-for-TV action-adventure?
The acting isn't bad nor is it great. It's definitely good enough for a made-for-TV movie. On top of that, you get to see Bob Newhart as a magic marine who kicks ass and saves the day. If nothing else, you should watch to see old Bob Newhart learn a few new tricks. ^_^
The music is pretty standard stuff. Think of it as a cross between Stargate SG-1 and Xena with some random rock beats tossed in for fun. It's perfectly suited for this kind of movie and doesn't try to step outside the box. Granted the rock beats got a little jarring at times due to their unexpectedness but the overall feel was fairly cohesive.
As for the 'action' portion of the program, it's more than fair. After all, if you're going to cast Kelly Hu in a movie, you make good use of the flair that she's known for, a touch of martial arts found in a good old-fashioned fist-fight. Hu's much more of a natural at this than her good-girl counterpart, but that's only to be expected since we are talking about the woman who got to give Wolverine as good as he gave. As for Bob Newhart, I couldn't possibly say whether or not he was good at the action bit. It's too weird for my mind to wrap around, but at the same time, I really liked him in this role. Noah Wyle was the brains so his fight scenes mostly involved him getting beaten up.
Overall, this was a really fun movie. I found myself watching it again when it re-aired. I dearly hope they make a sequel. This movie was much more conducive to a sequel than many other made-for-TV movies. I don't know that this would make a good series, but I'd be willing to bet it wouldn't be too bad if they tighten the story a little. After all, there's got to be a reason why there were so many threads left untied at the end of this movie.
