Robinson Crusoe

[Captain Jim]

I just watched a little clip of a previous episode. In the scene, he uses his musket to set off some gizmo that lights a bunch of bonfires. That appealed to my Rube Goldberg side.

Aye, and he takes out an incoming keg of fused gunpowder by shooting his ramrod at it after first heating the end red-hot in the fire. It would seem that their BP man has done reenacting and knows that it is possible to do so or perhaps worked on Patriot where a ramrod was accidentally shot on the set.

[Black Syren]

I think my problem with it is that while I may have enjoyed Xena and Hercules I was not aware of how Period Incorrect it was. Having learned so much of Pyracy and STILL learning I think I find it rather boring and can see the falseness, the Hollywood aspect if you will and I think that is why I do not like it. It does not fit with what I have learned..however Im still trying to watch it because it is nice to see a TV sitcom from that era...

Just don't look to it for history luv, it's pure fantasy; like LoTR or Firefly

Rumba - it's on NBC. Up here in more northerly regions of the west coast it airs on Friday nights (this Friday it's being pre-empted by local sports though, so check your local listings).

Ya know I started Hollywood style..and for me to post that..Well I had to re-read..I think Im slowly being converted...

[Graydog]

Ya know I started Hollywood style..and for me to post that..Well I had to re-read..I think Im slowly being converted...

Yes, my young apprentice, let your thirst for history well up within you. Release yourself to the dark…er…living history side! Muhahahahahaha

[Black Syren]

Oi I think I have..tis amazing what a few years of sitting back and watching has led me to. I have an itch that needs to be scratched and Im slowly working my way there. Thanks to all of you...

[Bart LeBaron]

It's not bad. The actors for Robinson and Friday are pretty good, but the supporting actors aren't so much. It has some good swashbuckling action: plenty of swordfights, explosions, and so on. Unfortunately, there aren't many other choices in terms of pirate TV shows, so I'll take what I can get.

[Silkie McDonough]

I think I will have to watch it until they cancel it.

[Lady Cassandra Seahawke]

Crusoe has been canceled, there are only 6 more episodes and the last episode is scheduled to air January 31.

"Crusoe" – 6 episodes

'Heroes and Villains' airs Saturday, 12/6 at 8pm ET

'Name of the Game' airs Saturday, 12/20 at 8pm ET

'Smoke and Mirrors' airs Saturday, 12/27 at 8pm ET

'The Hunting Party' airs Saturday, 1/10 at 8pm ET

'The Traveler' airs Saturday, 1/17 at 8pm ET

'The Return' airs Saturday, 1/31 at 8pm ET

Oh well so much for that

Edited December 11, 2008 by Lady Cassandra Seahawke

[Hester]

Airs on Saturday nights here, and since I actually have a social life, I've never been home when it's on, with the exception of one week when I was sick and accidentally caught the last 15 minutes of an episode.

My first thought was -- "I covet that treehouse!"

Second thought -- "I wonder when this will be available on DVD?"

Bring on those fantasy pirates and castaways, says I!

[Raphael Misson]

I watched the first disc on DVD. It's not bad. It's not really PC...in fact, there are many things about it that aren't PC that bucket boots are just a small thing. But if you throw that requirement out the window and just enjoy it on the POTC level, it's fun. As Blackjohn said, the first episode has a lot of interesting gadgets that he's cobbled together (which indeed borrows far more from Swiss Family Robinson than it does from the original book.)

As for having a lot of stuff, remember that the original Crusoe spent more than a little time retrieving things from his ship (something SFR also borrowed). Of course, they had to make a raft to go out to their respective ships, which makes more sense to me, while his ship conveniently went right up on the beach and spilled its contents all over the place. The book notes that Crusoe's clothes gradually fell apart over a period of years (which Defoe probably got from the original Selkirk account). However if there was as many bodies as are suggested in the opening scenes, this guy could have stored up a lot of clothing from them and their sea chests to replace the clothes of his that apart over time. So that's not THAT absurd as presented.

The second and third episodes have skulls, so they are good for me. The whole ancient water god thing was silly, though. As was the complicated alter/puzzle thing. One detail that pleased me immensely was that the remains of the sacrifice victim's bones were not assembled like we see in displays. That would never, never, never happen, despite decades of movies suggesting otherwise. Oh, and couldn't he find something useful to do with the gold cannon? I mean, gold is a nice soft metal and he could have found all sorts of utilitarian things to do with it.

My only gripe so far in general is all the flashbacks. Ok, I realize they're trying to use them to 1) give us backstory and 2) give the series a mental hook (without them, it's has a sort of Gilligan's island thing going on as Crusoe pines for escape while he and Friday do clever things to outwit nature, invaders and (apparently) some supernatural stuff. Still, they are somewhat annoying. (Did anyone NOT suspect that Sam Neill was up to no good by the end of the first episode?)

Still, overall, not too bad. Not exactly 'must see', but I'll get the other discs through Netflix and watch 'em with popcorn and my 12-year-old-kid pirate appreciation hat on. I give it 3.5 stars out of 5 so far.

Edited September 13, 2009 by Raphael Misson

[MarkG]

I watched the first disc on DVD. It's not bad. It's not really PC...in fact, there are many things about it that aren't PC that bucket boots are just a small thing. But if you throw that requirement out the window and just enjoy it on the POTC level, it's fun. As Blackjohn said, the first episode has a lot of interesting gadgets that he's cobbled together (which indeed borrows far more from Swiss Family Robinson than it does from the original book.)

As for having a lot of stuff, remember that the original Crusoe spent more than a little time retrieving things from his ship (something SFR also borrowed). Of course, they had to make a raft to go out to their respective ships, which makes more sense to me, while his ship conveniently went right up on the beach and spilled its contents all over the place. The book notes that Crusoe's clothes gradually fell apart over a period of years (which Defoe probably got from the original Selkirk account). However if there was as many bodies as are suggested in the opening scenes, this guy could have stored up a lot of clothing from them and their sea chests to replace the clothes of his that apart over time. So that's not THAT absurd as presented.

The second and third episodes have skulls, so they are good for me. The whole ancient water god thing was silly, though. As was the complicated alter/puzzle thing. One detail that pleased me immensely was that the remains of the sacrifice victim's bones were not assembled like we see in displays. That would never, never, never happen, despite decades of movies suggesting otherwise. Oh, and couldn't he find something useful to do with the gold cannon? I mean, gold is a nice soft metal and he could have found all sorts of utilitarian things to do with it.

My only gripe so far in general is all the flashbacks. Ok, I realize they're trying to use them to 1) give us backstory and 2) give the series a mental hook (without them, it's has a sort of Gilligan's island thing going on as Crusoe pines for escape while he and Friday do clever things to outwit nature, invaders and (apparently) some supernatural stuff. Still, they are somewhat annoying. (Did anyone NOT suspect that Sam Neill was up to no good by the end of the first episode?)

Still, overall, not too bad. Not exactly 'must see', but I'll get the other discs through Netflix and watch 'em with popcorn and my 12-year-old-kid pirate appreciation hat on. I give it 3.5 stars out of 5 so far.

One bit that I really liked was that they heated the rammer before shooting it into a barrel of gunpowder. Just shooting a ball into a barrel of powder is unlikely to set it off (sorry Captain Jack).

The flashbacks become more important later in the series when some English show up on the island.

Mark

[Bright]

Twevle episodes on hulu each abut 43 minuets in lenth and some behind the seance too

http://www.hulu.com/search?query=Crusoe

[Raphael Misson]

Indeed, the flashbacks do make a little more sense in the context of the whole storyline. However, they did something I personally found sort of annoying with the whole flashback thing; they started showing things that had happened that Robinson couldn't possibly know about, using the flashback "intro" (a hodgepodge of images with an appropriate "whooshing" sound). Then, even worse, they started showing things that were happening 'real time' in England with the same intro? Why use the flashback intro? But it's a minor gripe.

The middle disc (Episodes 4-7, I believe) was fine and adventurey with lots of skeletons. So that was fun. Robinson is proving to be a most moral hero, which is also kind of nice. You don't get such heroes very often these days. They really like playing Robinson off against Friday, which makes sense, I suppose, given that they are the two main characters of the story. (Well, and Dundee. He's a main character.) The doctor stuff was pretty amusing and I thought they did a pretty nice job of it from what I know. The thing with the ant pincers is from one of the books I read on medicine (darned if I can remember which one), so someone did some nice research.

The last disc really brought the flashbacks together, which is pretty much what I figured it would do with the backstory/mental hook concept. They appeared to be setting the female doctor up to be a villain in season two (this show really telegraphs its intentions IMO), which would have been a shame I think. I'd rather see her ally with Susana. Oh, and they failed me on the skeleton front by making the original ship's cook a skinless skeleton that held together. So they got one skeleton right and one wrong. But this is sort of like whining about bucket boots, so I'll just stop.

It's kind of a shame they couldn't end the series in episode 12 with Robinson returning home and Friday returning to his father (if that could happen, given the things he said in previous episode.) I'm sure they wanted to continue the series, but it would have made a magnificent maxi-series (as opposed to a mini-series) the way it was constructed. One wonders if they would have started meddling with Robin's pure heartedness (if that's a word) as the series went into additional seasons. They often do things like this in later series' season to make them more enticing. On this front, at least, I'm glad they didn't have a next season.

So I bump it to 4 of 5 stars based on the nice story arc. Plus it had three of my favorite sort of underrated (IMO) actors in it: Sam Neill, Anna Walton and Sean Bean. Good stuff, worth a watch.