Miscellaneous Mondays: Dinosaurs and Zombies

Terra Nova

I watched the first three episodes of this online. I was curious because the premise is so cheese-filled and outlandish, it rivals even to most contrived dystopian YA novel. For those of you that missed the commercials, it's about people from the year 2149, when the Earth has become overcrowded and polluted, that travel through a rift in time to the age of the dinosaurs in order to start a new colony. Ridiculous? Yes. Delightfully cheesey? Absolutely.

I ended up really enjoying this first episode. We meet Jim and his wife Elisabeth. They have 3 children, and in 2149 families are supposed to be restricted to two. One thing the show did really well was that it established, in very little time, how harsh the conditions of the 2149 world are. You see the family get really excited about and orange that Jim found. And then you see population control come and raid their house, where they find the third child and send Jim to jail as a result. Jumping ahead in the plot, once the family travels through the time rift the show takes a turn from gritty dytopian to bright fantasy world. The thing is, though, even here I can't fault them. The show is very imaginative in it's vision of humans coping in a world dominated by dinosaurs. The show stumbles on it's own "science" a bit, explaining (in awkward dialogue) that this is in fact a separate time stream from the own they were living in, so no worries about those pesky paradoxes.

Episodes 2 and 3 confirmed to me that there are a lot of interesting stories that could be written in this universe. I find the character's likable, the setting and plots interesting, and the overall tone to be good dramatic sci-fi fun. I'm caught up now, so I may be able to watch the shows at the time they air (if I remember) from here on out.

The Secret Circle, Episode 4


This was actually a surprisingly good episode. Cassie wants to use the magic in her family's spell book to help a woman who appears catatonic, in order to get some answers about the fire that killed everyone's parents. I liked seeing Cassie actually take some kind of action, even if the decisions she made were rash. And as I've said before, I like the fantasy element of this show, so having an episode that's more focused on that than anything else was a big plus.

Clothing My Wedding Party...

...has certainly been an adventure. I picked out my dress in July, and it was the third one I tried on. I went in pretty much knowing what I wanted, found the perfect dress, and that was that. So imagine my surprise when it turned out to be about three times as hard to find bridesmaid dresses that I really liked.  It was really important to me that my minions friends have something that they like and feel pretty in. I was well prepared to be flexible, and I told them they could pick whatever they liked as long as they were all the same color. They really wanted to match though, so the search was on to find something that would flatter three very different body types. We finally found this one, and I have to say I'm quite pleased with it. The waist is designed to create a nice hourglass shape. There's some subtle beading on the bodice and underskirt that compliments my dress (which has quite a lot of bead-work).

I still have to find something for my junior bridesmaid, who will be 9 at the time of the wedding. I have no idea what a 9 year old would feel comfortable in, so that will be interesting. Plus we have to figure out what the guys are wearing, but boys have it easier, right?

Weekly Poll Results: Your Favorite Classic Monster

Zombies prevailed over all contenders with 21% of the votes! I was pretty surprised by this, because I was so sure it would be vampires or werewolves. But not even close! Ghosts came in second place by only one vote! Apparently you guys like dead things.

I think my favorite zombie book would have to be one of the early Anita Blake books, most likely The Laughing Corpse. I don't really have a favorite zombie movie. Possibly Shaun of the Dead, but I've only seen it once. Anybody have good recommendations for zombie books or movies? Share!

Finally, don't forget to participate in the new weekly poll: What influences your reading choices? Happy Reading!