Survivors - The Remake

I loved the original of Survivors from the 70's (I was too young to see it first time round but watched the whole thing a few years ago). The first episode of the remake was broadcast tonight.

I thought it was very good overall and a fair attempt at capturing the feeling of the original but updated for the modern day.

Good Things:

- Some nice nods to the original, e.g. "Please God, don't let me be the only one" being used in exactly the same way, having a well known actor who had been trailed as "starring" in it be one of the ones to die (Freema Agyeman in this one (and to an extent Shaun Dingwell), Peter Bowles in the original).
- Pacing was OK and the feeling of desolation was handled better than I had been expecting (although by no means perfect)
- The twist of having some sort of government silo with people contained within was a good idea which I did not see coming and which should provide an interesting counterpoint to the above ground action in the coming episodes. This was completely absent from the original.
- Nods to other apocalyptic dramas, "The Stand" with the way Max Beesley's character was nearly left for dead by a screw and "The Last Train" with the government facility being used for people to survive the catastrophe.
- Elements of Terry Nation's survivalist ideas coming through but the audience was not beaten over the head with it (in the original, characters were basically used as ciphers for Nations ideas in this area). It was done a bit more subtly here.
-Paterson Joseph!

Not so Good Things:

- The music was annoying at times (although that is de rigeur these days - I just wish they'd had the courage to tone it down). One of the great things about the original was the quietness of some of the scenes which helped with the feeling of desertion greatly.
- That "sassy" kid is starting to bug me already.
- The opening titles were not a patch on the original.
- The "Coming Next Time" thing is really going to piss me off as I really do not want to know for this series. I will have to be pretty quick with the remote.
- This is a real fanboy one but it would have been great for Peter Bowles to have had another cameo in this, maybe as a doctor or a government adviser, or even the Prime Minister. A real missed opportunity there although probably only about 50 people in the country would have truly appreciated it!

I suppose the only other thing for now is the decision already to muck around with the scheduling. I bet there will be some people who really enjoyed tonight's episode who will tune in next Sunday only to find it is on on Tuesdays from now on. It's almost like they are willing it to fail. I hope I am wrong.