Farewell Terra Nova

So, Fox cancelled Terra Nova. I'm not really surprised... bad acting + slow storytelling made for low ratings, and a gazillion dollar budget meant it wasn't worth a second round. Honestly, I don't think it was that terrible. There were plot lines that intrigued me - What is the writing on the rocks?! Who is sending these people!? Is Taylor bad? Is his son bad? Ahh! - and the finale was pretty great - Are they seriously starting civlization over?! Without any technology or medicine or anything?! The problem is people were too obsessed with bad dinosaurs, they couldn't get to enjoying the actual story. Remember how LOST did not show you the monster? And it was still scary? And when it did turn out to be a weird rope bully system and/or black smoke, you were already invested and didn't care if it was lame? That is what Terra Nova should have done. We didn't need to see bad CGI-dinos to know they were a threat. You just killed your budget.

Any who, Shep from Let's Talk TV thinks this is good news for Alcatraz - also low in the ratings. With openings from Terra Nova and the end of House, Fox needs something to stick around and fill the spot. Good news for me, because I actually adore Alcatraz.

Dear Terra Nova,

You don't need the dinosaurs.

Before watching, I heard a lot of bad things about you. The acting was bad. The special effects were worse. You were just a Land of the Lost remake.

Terra Nova, you aren' that bad. You are actually kind of.... good. The mystery behind the 'sixers' has me intrigued- what do they want? who sent them? can I call them 'The Others' instead? And then you throw in a family struggling to keep it together... A leader who I'm not sure if I should love or hate or wonder what happens if I melt his wax face (seriously, that guy is weird looking)..... weird writing on the rocks from the leaders son (I guess?) regarding controlling the future (I guess?)... To be honest, I don't even care about the dinosaurs. I don't care about how 'cool' and modern the future looked. I care way more about these mysterious characters!

Word to the wise.... dont' give it all away in the first episode. In the first two hours, we learned the future sucks, you can't have more than 2 kids, you get recruited or win a lottery to go back in time to some parallel universe, there's this leader who makes this place to be all sunshine and rainbows but it is so not, there is a group that separated from the original settlement, the leader's son went missing, there are mysterious writings on rocks in an area that is off limits, and that the writing is done by the leaders 'crazy' son..... That's a lot.

Also, Dear Jason O' Mara,
Why do you always play a cop who travels back in time?