D Airey

I've learned my lesson. I was going to skip this movie until I checked it out on IMDb. Wow, three people gave it a pretty good review. Maybe it's worth a chance. After watching the movie, it now appears these people had some vested interest in posting other than a fair review of the movie. Take, for instance, Jon H Ochiai. After I saw this terrible movie, I wondered who in the world would recommend an obvious stinker like this. So I took a look at some of Mr. Ochiai's other reviews. This guy appears to be someone with classical training as a movie reviewer, except there are no bad recommendations in his voluminous collection of reviews. I'm guessing there must be some cottage industry for people that can't land a steady gig for a real media outlet, so they pump these movies while they wait for an honest job.

Lesson one: Sci-Fi makes terrible movies. I'll not watch another premier.

Lesson two: There are people that pump these movies just like they have people pumping stocks on Yahoo. Though I still have trouble envisioning the economic model (are they really paid, or like the bad guys in these movies, are they just pure evil).

Lesson three: There are no low budget movies with four writers that are worth watching.

This mini-series is a waste of time. My overall reaction after watching the opening segment is that you couldn't have placed more clichés in the movie if you had been trying to make a parody. In fact, if you had given the actors instructions to ham it up a little, it could be called "Not Another Fantasy Adventure". Now some may argue that it's unfair to review a four hour movie after just the first two hours, but my conscience compels me to warn others: This is an empty story that doesn't contain a single original thought. Everything is predictable.

We have Luke/Harry Potter/Ged meeting Obi Wan Kenobi/Gandalf and being sent to Hogwarts. While at Hogwarts, Luke/Harry Potter/Ged meets the generic, fat, comic relief sidekick. Later, Dumbledore/Gandalf/Archmangus is killed by the generic, twisted bad guy King/General because Malfoy/Jasper is a traitor (and not a single wizard saw it coming). We have the sisterhood from Dune and elements of Lord Foul's Bane in the indestructible beast that is controlled by knowing its name.

This is a good movie to watch if you are hooked up to a life-support system and you've already seen every movie and television show ever made. This story is also a good idea for people who've never read a book or seen a movie and want to jam the entire fantasy genre into a single four hour sitting.