Sam Raimi’s Legend of the Seeker makes for a couple hours of entertaining television. Is it earth-shatteringly refreshing television? By no means.

Based on Terry Goodkind’s epic Sword of Truth series, Legend of the Seeker tells how farmboy Richard Cypher meets Lady Confessor Kahlan Annell. Kahlan is fleeing the troops of power-hungry Lord Darken Rahl when she breaks through the boundary between the war-torn Midlands and the idyllic Westland where Richard lives his life of quietude. In short order, they meet up with wizard Zeddicus Zu’l Zorander, who entrusts Richard with a quest of the utmost importance.

As you can tell, a lot of well-worn fantasy tropes are at work here: a farmboy unaware of his heritage, a dark lord bent on world domination, and a wise and eccentric old wizard devoted to helping the hero. Still, the pacing and storytelling in Legend of the Seeker is such that these clichés aren’t such a big problem for the show. Filmed in New Zeland with the help of many who worked on the Lord of the Rings films, the production values on this show are pretty impressive. The action and visual effects, while not on par with feature films, certainly more than hold their own.

For a TV series premiere, this episode reveals a whole lot of information. By the end of the two-hour premiere, the viewer will know, roughly, who Richard is and what he must do, though readers of the books will know there are a few more surprises in store. If my favorite TV show LOST revealed information an plot points at this rate, it wouldn’t have made it past its third season.

The real problem with Legend of the Seeker lies in its uneven acting. The standout performance is Craig Parker, who played the ill-fated elf Haldir in the Lord of the Rings films, as the villain Darken Rahl. He’s the only character who really feels like he belongs in this world. The female performances in particular are rather weak; the unabashedly American accets make some of the female-centric scenes feel like a dressed-up version of Desperate Housewives. The male actors don’t fare much better, sounding as if they belong on the set of a modern action flick rather than an epic fantasy.

I’m not necessarily espousing the notion that all actors in fantasy movies and television should speak with an English accent–Oxford English for the nobility, Cockney for the vile henchmen. I’m simply arguing that whatever maner of speech is chosen should fit the world and the story being told. In this case, it doesn’t. For some, this could be a deal-breaker. For me, it was simply an annoyance.

The show has been picked up for an entire first season. My hunch is that it won’t be renewed for a second run next year. The show is off to a rocky start, but there’s enough promising potential to make for an admirable adventure of swords and sorcery.

I may not review every week’s episode, but I’ll keep readers abreast of how I feel the show is developing.

“Wizard’s First Rule” (Terry Goodkind)

Supersite Ain’t-It-Cool News has gathered snippets of reviews for the pilot episode of Sam Raimi’s Legend of the Seeker, a show filmed in New Zeland and based on Terry Goodkind’s epic Sword of Truth series. Most of the reviews are less than flattering.

I must admit that, having read the first four books, I’m not a fan of the series. I find a lot of the violence gratuitous and many of the characters derivative and uninteresting. The only real characters of interest to me in the series are the dominatrix-like red-leather-clad Mord Sith, who undergo some interesting development as the books progress.

You can check out the show’s official site here. I watched the first ten minutes of the show online a week or so ago, but as of this posting I can’t seem to find the link. You can, however, download some free preview material from the show’s page on iTunes. In any case, fans of the series haven’t long to wait. The show premieres tonight on ABC. Not wishing to fall into the vice of contempt prior to investigation, I too will be watching the show and reporting my findings here in the next day or so.

More juicy tidbits behind the veil.

In some ways, these two episodes do form a cohesive unit, and so are perhaps better reviewed together. Several plotlines are introduced in 3×05, “Angels and Monsters”, that arent resolved until 3×06, “Dying of the Light”.

In an attempt to make good with Daphne and infiltrate her company and retrieve his father’s formula, time-bender Hiro Nakamura makes an apparently unthinkable sacrifice of his friend and sidekick Ando. We learn, of course, that this was mere subterfuge, and that Ando is alive and well.

Claire and her adoptive mother Sandra Bennet team up, “one of us, one of them” style, to rescue Claire’s firebrand biomom Meredith from the “puppet-master” Eric Doyle. Although somewhat predictable, the scenario that plays out among them is one of the best-shot and creepiest that Heroes has brought forth in a long time. From eerie music to jarring camera angles to superb acting, the scenes shine out as a cut above the rest.

The other redeeming factor in episode 3×06 is mind-reading former-cop Matt Parkman. Aided by his new totem guide, the tortoise, Parkman searches for Daphne in an attempt to save her from a horrible future fate. Actor Greg Grunberg brings great humanity to the role, along with a touch of sardonic humor, without overdoing it.

From an overarching plot perspective, we’re also learning more about the oft-sighted but little-explained Pinehearst Corporation, which we now learn is headed by none other than long-presumed-dead Arthur Petrelli. Along with Matt Parkman’s mind-manipulating father Maury, Arthur Petrelli is evidently trying to infuse the entire world with abilities. It’s unclear just where these threads are leading, but battle lines are slowly being drawn.

There have lately been rumblings that, like my other favorite TV show Lost, Heroes is becoming too convoluted for the average casual viewer to follow. The cynical part of me clamors in agreement, citing the ADD-prone state of the American populace. My more compassionate, utopian side, however, wants to believe that viewers have faith in the power of storytelling. Heroes has the potential to satisfy that desire in a big way, but only lives up to that potential about half the time.

This episode cuts between the present day and four years in the future, when a chemical formula gives abilities to normal people. As you’d expect, the proliferation of superpowers is wreaking havoc.

Who created this formula? Right now, signs point to scientist Mohinder Suresh, who stumbles across the formula while attempting to figure out how to reverse the “Black Death” ability of his new love interest Maya. His reasoning, apparently, is that if he can bestow abilities he can also take them away. Testing this formula on himself, Mohinder finds himself possessed with increased strength and agility. But there’s a catch. He’s also becoming more aggressive, and strange insect-like rashes are breaking out on his body. A shadowy glimpse at future Mohinder shows that, irony of ironies, he’s transforming into a cockroach-like bug man, à la Jeff Goldbloom and Gregor Samsa. From the very beginning, the cockroach in Heroes has been a symbol of evolution and the adaptability of life. Now the symbol reveals a darker side, as if cockroaches weren’t creepy enough to begin with.

Anyhow, Peter seeks answers with future Sylar, who has taken up residence in the old Bennet house in Costa Verde, California, with his tow-headed son. That’s right, Sylar has a son. Evidently he’s turned over a new leaf in the future, although, as he tells Peter, he must exert constant effort to keep his “hunger” for abilities in check. Reluctantly, Sylar teaches Peter his own method of stealing the powers of others. Just then, Claire, the speedster Daphne, and the fear-monger Knox arrive on the scene, with the intent of killing Peter and somehow thereby changing this awful future. Sylar’s son is inadvertently killed in the fracas. Overcome with grief and rage, Sylar boils over with the nuclear ability he nabbed from Ted Sprague in season one. Costa Verde and its 200,000 inhabitants perish in a mushroom cloud.

If the show’s creators can hold to the high standards they’ve set in this episode, season three should restore Heroes to a place of prominence after the negative press heaped on it for season two. Tune in next week to find out whether it succeeds in this endeavor.

The story arc of this chapter is slowly becoming clearer. It would appear that once again the future has been thrown into chaos, this time because someone has concocted a formula capable of giving abilities to common folk. Meanwhile, the escaped super-villains from the super-secure Level 5 facility continue to wreak havoc.

This episode derives its name from the fact that the mysterious hero-tracking “Company” hires its agents in pairs, one with special abilities and one without. The particular pairing of partners in this episode took me completely by surprise. Two enemies team up for a common cause. A couple of old favorite characters return, namely the memory-blotting Haitian and the Computer Whsiperer Micah. The latter, I think, will make few if any further appearances, but the former seems integral to this season’s plot.

Starting next week, the TV reviews will contain spoilers. Be assured that I’ll give you plenty of warning beforehand so the show won’t be inadvertently ruined for you.

The TV show, under the capable leadership of Alan Ball (Six Feet Under), manages to hold true to its source material while making it palatable to HBO’s viewership. With some minor exceptions, the show’s plot follows beat-for-beat the plot of Charlaine Harris’s work. Alan Ball has chosen to write a new character into the story, Sookie’s hot-headed African-American best friend Tara. Her character is so well-written and richly developed that she fits right in with the rest of the colorful cast. Since she’s black, Tara also brings the issue of race, dealt with in the book only obliquely, to the forefront.

The show succeeds because it plays so well on the strengths of Harris’s novel. The social and cultural implications of vampires living in our midst never cease to intrigue. Normally, I find that characters are more three-dimensional on the page than on the screen, but in the case of True Blood I actually find the opposite to be true. Sookie’s brother Jason, for example, who is implicated in several grizzly murders, gets much more time front-and-center than he does in the novel. For the most part, the new situations developed for these characters feel as though they’re in keeping with Charlaine Harris’s original conceptions.

The highlight performance here is Anna Paquin’s portrayal of protagonist Sookie Stackhouse. Hers is an incredibly complex character, and Paquin transitions easily between her fiery spunk and her emotional vulnerability. Sookies mind-reading ability is also handled fairly well.

The vampires themselves are downright creepy. This show certainly wouldn’t fly on a primetime network; there’s far too much profanity, sex, and violence, and all these things are critical to the story.

I think there are eight more episodes to go this season, and the show has already been given the go-ahead for a second run. If it maintains its momentum, True Blood will be yet another jewel in HBO’s already-encrusted original series crown.

A spirit walker, an ice queen, and the eponymous villains!

Just when I think the show has totally jumped the shark, Heroes redeems itself with a fun, fast-paced episode. The high point of this episode, for me, was Ali Larter’s new character, Tracy Strauss, is so far vastly superior to her Niki and Jessica Sanders split personality of the first two seasons. The writers aren’t taking the easy way out and pretending Niki never existed, though. Strauss is a dead-ringer for the super-strength-packing stripper, which is is jeopardizing her position in the New York political machine.

Mind-reading Matt Parkman ends up in a desert somewhere in Africa, where he meets a spirit walker who paints prophetic images on rocks, similar to the comic sketches of Isaac Mendez in the first season. I really enjoyed the divination-through-art motif the first time around, and I’m looking forward to its further development this season.

Given that this chapter is entitled Villains, it’s probably not letting too many cats out of the bag to reveal that, by the end of this episode, a dozen empowered and enraged bad guys are loosed upon the world. If handled ineptly, this could turn into a hydra of plot threads poised to strangle the show’s powerful storytelling. Done well, however, the appearance of these menaces could make for interesting power struggles and shifts in allegiance.

The major storyline of season three still seems murky and byzantine, but there are so many fun moments in this episode that the Theseus-like viewer is enticed to follow the labyrinthine path anyway.

I’m not a huge watcher of television, but the few shows I do watch fall well within the focus of this blog. NBC’s Heroes , now in its third season, tells the stories of a ever-growing cast of ordinary people who discover that they have extraordinary powers. Think a more emotionally mature version of X-Men. Of course, not all people who find they have superpowers intend to use them to plant trees and save puppies. A classic conflict between good and evil ensues.

This third chapter of the series, dubbed Villains, promises to explore that conflict not only between characters but also within their own personae. I wont give away too many plot spoilers, as I do encourage people to watch the show and I don’t ruin all their fun. But I’ll give some general impressions.

Overall, the first episode of the season, “The Second Coming,” is a hodge-podge. The episode wastes no time in answering the question posed by the season two cliffhanger, but then embarks on a series of new adventures for all our old favorites. The Japanese time-traveling businessman Hiro Nakamura, the regenerating Claire Bennett, the mind-reading Matt Parker, and the multitalented empath Peter Petrelli all face brand new challenges. The ability-stealing Sylar, newly repossessed of his powers, so far still looms as the show’s arch-villain. Given the title of this story arc, though, and the hints of the show’s producers, I expect that’s going to change soon.

Anyhow, all the new storylines introduced promise exciting adventure and thought-provoking mysteris to come. Right now, though, it’s unclear exactly where it’s all leading. My sense is that, due to a lot of the criticism that the show’s second season received, the creators are trying to return to the formula that made Season One so successful: an impending world disaster, an enigmatic Sylar, and the antics of Hiro Nakamura and his sidekick Ando.

Of particular interest to me are the larger questions this series raises. Where do these superpowers come from? What is their biological, social, and spiritual impact? How much about oneself does one disclose to one’s fellows? This episode formulates some of these questions to some extent, and promises further exploration of these themes throughout the season. One of the characters, for instance, turns to God, specifically the Christian God, as a way of explaining to the world some of the things that have happened to him. Whether he himself believes this or whether he’s merely taking this tack as a ploy to appease the public–he is a politician after all–is yet to be clarified. I bring this up because it’s these moral and spiritual implications that form the underpinnings of my interest in fantasy, science fiction, and speculative fiction of all sorts and in all media.

It’s clear that the pendulum in the television world has swung back to the mode of long, sweeping story-arcs rather than the bite-sized self-contained episodes that predominated in the late ’90s. There’s no way that anyone who hasn’t seen the previous seasons of Heroes would derive much emotional enjoyment from watching this single episode beyond a brief surge or twinge at key moments. I have enough faith in Tim Kring and the show’s writers, however, that the half-baked ideas presented here will rise into a moist and delicious confection.

I hope to watch the followup episode, “The Butterfly Effect,” within the next day or two and post my impressions.