Post by politician2 on Jul 29, 2023 12:02:33 GMT
I remember watching (and enjoying) this seventies science fiction series as a child, so am indulging some nostalgia by watching it again from the beginning on BritBox. I'm currently halfway through the third series (of eight).
All I can say is that this programme has not aged well.
Apparently it had half the budget of Dr Who, and it shows. The Tomorrow People makes even the worst episode of early seventies Who (when it was going through one of its patchier phases) look like 2001: A Space Odyssey in comparison. Wooden or melodramatic acting, bizarre and unconvincing plots, silly costumes, stupid-looking aliens with idiotic plans, broad and unfunny comedy, lousy special effects and very, very bad science – the show has it all. It also embodies one of the worst traits of Dr Who in that many of the stories build slowly before reaching a sudden deus ex machina ending that comes out of left-field and takes about 10 minutes to wrap everything up. But whereas Who did this only occasionally, The Tomorrow People appears to indulge this trait in nearly every story.
It's a pity, as the actual premise – a new type of telepathic human being emerging, with selected individuals discovering their new powers at puberty – is rather interesting. So was the premise of the best story I've watched so far – a child hands in an identical painting of an alien landscape in a number of schools; the weather depicted in the picture mysteriously changes from day to day and when it becomes stormy the children start fighting and rioting – but once again the dénouement is rushed and unconvincing.
In fact, the most notable things about the programme is that it was remarkably "woke" for its era, with an unusual number of characters (for a seventies show) from minority (black, gypsy, etc.) backgrounds. This doesn't always work to its advantage: the little black kid in the first series is horribly wooden and has a lisp that gets increasingly irritating. From the second series onwards, they replaced him with a young black woman: unlike most other people in the show, she's an excellent actress and is rather wasted in it. Apparently she stayed with it until the end because she thought it was important for a prime-time show to have a black lead, even though she felt the quality of the scripts was declining steadily. That makes me wonder how much worse it's going to get, but it still has a certain car-crash (and nostalgic) appeal.
All I can say is that this programme has not aged well.
Apparently it had half the budget of Dr Who, and it shows. The Tomorrow People makes even the worst episode of early seventies Who (when it was going through one of its patchier phases) look like 2001: A Space Odyssey in comparison. Wooden or melodramatic acting, bizarre and unconvincing plots, silly costumes, stupid-looking aliens with idiotic plans, broad and unfunny comedy, lousy special effects and very, very bad science – the show has it all. It also embodies one of the worst traits of Dr Who in that many of the stories build slowly before reaching a sudden deus ex machina ending that comes out of left-field and takes about 10 minutes to wrap everything up. But whereas Who did this only occasionally, The Tomorrow People appears to indulge this trait in nearly every story.
It's a pity, as the actual premise – a new type of telepathic human being emerging, with selected individuals discovering their new powers at puberty – is rather interesting. So was the premise of the best story I've watched so far – a child hands in an identical painting of an alien landscape in a number of schools; the weather depicted in the picture mysteriously changes from day to day and when it becomes stormy the children start fighting and rioting – but once again the dénouement is rushed and unconvincing.
In fact, the most notable things about the programme is that it was remarkably "woke" for its era, with an unusual number of characters (for a seventies show) from minority (black, gypsy, etc.) backgrounds. This doesn't always work to its advantage: the little black kid in the first series is horribly wooden and has a lisp that gets increasingly irritating. From the second series onwards, they replaced him with a young black woman: unlike most other people in the show, she's an excellent actress and is rather wasted in it. Apparently she stayed with it until the end because she thought it was important for a prime-time show to have a black lead, even though she felt the quality of the scripts was declining steadily. That makes me wonder how much worse it's going to get, but it still has a certain car-crash (and nostalgic) appeal.