Jimmy's Sci-fi Corner: Dinotopia

Remember the last TV mini-series you saw on regular network television? For me, it was Dinotopia (2002), the 4 hour epic originating in James Gurney's children books. Essentially, two brothers crash a plane, and wash up on shore of an island. The island is filled with dinosaurs coexisting with people in a utopia. But with every utopia comes problems. They eventually travel in a submarine and try to save Dinotopia from the carnivores and the island-wide power outage.

The story is really interesting, the plot is so-so, and the acting is good at times and sub par at times. David Thewlis's Cyrus Crabb is my favorite character followed closely by Katie Carr's Marion. The visuals are really cool even though some of the dinosaurs look fake, but if you accept that this is an under funded TV mini-series, you'll be fine. I mean, some of the visuals in ABC's Lost looked fake, but we still loved that show to the end, or at least I did.

With all its flaws, I thoroughly enjoyed the Dinotopia miniseries (which ABC made into a horribly written and acted TV series that didn't last a whole season.) It runs 250 minutes and is a family friendly flick. I give it 7 ramheads out of 10.