Friday, January 10, 2014

The first 15 minutes of Helix is cut awkwardly in parts but still manages to reel me in

Notice the black goo dripping from this guy's left ear. Chilling, isn't it?
So Helix starts tonight on SyFy, and if memory serves me correctly, we get another episode tomorrow night as well. But don't quote me on that (I think I saw something on my DVR).

My first impression in watching the trailer and then the first 15-minutes was that it has a setting I like, i.e., Antarctica, and it looks to kind of be an end of the world thriller about a disease that turns your blood black, leaves its victims disfigured with horrific black veins all over their body (and bleeding from every orifice), and also imbues them with maddening strength and just sheer crazy.

There were parts of it that are cut awkwardly to truncate conversation and maybe not reveal so much to the audience. That's okay as I'm willing to watch the uncut pilot tonight. I know that they're just trying to pique my interest, and I consider this "mission accomplished" by the cliffhanger left in the last few seconds.
This is my favorite story that takes place in Antarctica. It was remade by
John Carpenter into a great all male film that still leads me to question
which of the survivors at the end was the Thing and which wasn't? Maybe
Helix is going to take this question and say that the disease is going to
have some kind of outer space origin. That would be really cool.
There are a few questions that come to mind. Most notably, I ask, "So is this a reinvention of the whole zombie apocalypse?" If it does turn out to be that I won't care much. I love zombie-esque stories. I also love stories where the stakes are incredibly high (as in the movie "Outbreak" with Renee Russo and Dustin Hoffman).

Additionally we are treated to a real science fiction atmosphere with the base in Antarctica. This is no remote all male outpost with the survivors of The Thing from Another World eeking out an existence amid sled dogs and low technology. The base more than anything, resembles the facility you saw underground in Cabin in the Woods, with glass elevators that descend into the ice for thousands of feet to vaults where dangerous disease strains are held in cryogenic storage away from the population centers of the world.

So here is the question of the day: Are any of you out there going to either record or watch Helix tonight? I've been excited about it for a few months now, but still don't know much about it. I guess I shall see soon enough.

23 comments:

  1. io9 gave it a very good review. They praised it enough that I plan on watching it in full tonight. I didn't watch the first 15 mins though, I figured that if I did like it I would be frustrated by only seeing that much. I'm looking forward to it.

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  2. I plan to watch it. See how much fun they can make out of a pandemic anyway.

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  3. Glass elevators in Antarctica? Yeah, right.

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  4. I'm going to give it a shot tonight, and I think they're running back to back episodes tonight so another late night of TV.

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  5. I've heard good things about it, but I probably won't watch because I really don't have time to start a new series these days.

    But I'm sure I'll record it anyway.

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  6. @P.T.: Like you have anything better to do on a Friday night. You should watch it and then we can compare notes.

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  7. Watching TV really disrupts my schedule of playing Jewel Quest on my Kindle Fire.

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  8. Looks impressive. Defintely the sought of programme I'd watch. Unfortunately, I don't have Sky. Will have to wait for the DVD.

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  9. It will be another thing that I might catch once it's on dvd.

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  10. Yeesh, black veins--sounds scary. I'm looking forward to that cyber-cop show with Sawyer from Lost-forget the real title.

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  11. I might watch during tomorrow's marathon.

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  12. I might watch this, if I get drunk enough.

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  13. I'll probably give it a go to see if it catches my interest. I managed three whole episodes of Agents of Shield before giving up on that. Only two of Blacklist. Let's see how far i can get with this one.

    mood
    Moody Writing

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  14. It sounds interesting. Will try and watch.

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  15. I've been going back and forth on this one. I haven't seen all that much or read all that much about it, and I like to have some idea what a show is about before I jump in.

    Then again, there have been a few shows (Orphan Black...) where I didn't know much, but ended up loving.

    Orphan Black is coming back! I can't wait.

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  16. I'll probably skip this one, mostly because I just don't enjoy things that are set in super cold locations as much. When I'm watching TV I like to escape to warm places, like the beach. I probably miss a lot of good shows with this logic, though.

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  17. I missed it but your description makes we want to catch the pilot when it repeats. Ebola-type diseases (as in Outbreak and bleeding from orifices) are a real-life scare for me.

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  18. I missed it, of course. I'm so far behind on everything. I just started watching Breaking Bad on Netflix - up to season 4. I miss everything good cuz I don't pay enough attention.

    Sometimes I think ADD would be a good thing.

    ......dhole

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  19. Sounds like a show my hubby would LOVE. Probably not my thing! :) :) :) And as I'm reading Donna's comment above me, we just finished Breaking Bad and holy crap... it was ah-mazing.

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  20. Helix kept my attention, that's for sure. I do like the horror aspect mixed with the science fiction.

    It's still too early to tell, but hopefully the show finds its stride.

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  21. I haven't heard about the show, but it looks good. I look forward to your opinion on it. Have a great week!

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  22. I haven't seen the first episode, I will probably leave it for later in the year. I'm currently busy watching ALMOST HUMAN, DRACULA and REIGN, and WALKING DEAD, and will be with MUSKETEERS and BLACK SAILS and KLONDIKE which all start this month.

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