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Review of Spartacus: Blood and Sand
Back in August, 2009, I said of the trailer for Spartacus: Blood and Sand that it looked a bit like a cross between 300 and Gladiator but with more sex, violence and Lucy Lawless, a formula that I think is hard to go wrong with. The first season has now finished, 13 episodes strong and complete with clunky, leaden dialogue, pornographic levels of sex and nudity, heavily-stylised violence and gore and some appalling acting from a cast mostly chosen for their ability to look good oiled up than for their theatrical credentials. It was the trashiest thing I'd seen for a long time, a show not just with a target audience of 14 year old boys but apparently a production and writing crew of a similar age. I watched the whole thing from start to finish and loved it to bits, and not even ironically. →
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Battlestar Galactica
The original Battlestar Galactica series wasn't something I ever watched, though being a proper SF geek I was at least aware of its existence and could happily hum the theme tune if asked. I'd seen bits of it, here and there, and was not impressed. It was just so camp, so cheap, so dated. It was for this reason that when I heard that the series was to be remade, I wasn't overly bothered. →