Sanctuary Review Episode One

by Sharm

I don’t want to render my opinion till I’ve watched a second episode of Sanctuary, although truthfully I’m not exactly counting the days to catch the next one. Okay, so it does look like I’ve just rendered my opinion. Never-mind, here’s my review.

The double episode that I watched Friday night, was not as quote ‘original’ unquote, a storyline as I had been led to believe. The Sanctuary itself reminds me of the Natural History museum in London, with all the high security gadgets of today. The monsters….Wait! Didn’t I see that one in a Buffy episode? Hmm…well it seems that sci-fi shows, all around including this original one, are renting out the same monsters for their stories. Honestly, do they think that us sci-fi buffs are really that open-minded to the possibility of the impossible, that we just won’t notice the rent-a-monster similarities? Anyway, I seem to be getting right off the subject here, which is a review for Sanctuary, the newest show on sci-fi. So here we go!

Stargate’s Amanda Tapping plays Helen Magnus, a 157 year old Scientist and collector of monsters, who also happens to have been the former fiancé of England’s infamous Jack the Ripper, before he turned evil of course, after getting a blood transfusion from the good Doctor/fiancé to save his life. In addition, he seems to also have fathered a child with her. Although, apparently Emilie Ullerup who plays their daughter Ashley was somehow frozen as an embryo for 100 years before she was finally born. I found her to be disappointing on first impression. Although dressed the part of tough Max from Dark Angel, she really came off looking like a really bad Buffy the vampire slayer wannabe. How old is she anyway?

Nope, the only character with substance that I found to have the slightest potential was Robin Dunn’s Medical Doctor/police officer, Will Zimmerman, Helen’s new recruit who has been suffering from nightmares all his life after his mother was killed by a monster. The other character who also might be worth a grain of salt, is our villain John Druit, the ex-fiancé played by Christopher Heyerhahl who has been chasing down his lover in hiding, to get just a little bit more blood from her, so he can continue to live and cause more mayhem. I suppose at this point, I should speak a little bit about the rest of the story in this episode. It revolves around a young boy born in Chernobyl Russia, adopted by a family who immigrated to the States, I don’t know when, since none of them spoke any English, and were frightened of this boy, who happens to have a snake-like appendage that eats brains. Hmm…The boy kills a member of the family, and Helen sends her daughter to capture him. You know the rest. Make of this review what you will.

Editors note: Since watching the second episode of Sanctuary, Sharm is willing to admit that the show might be "okay".

Return from Sanctuary Review Episode One to TV