Andromeda

growing band of spacefarers travelling around having adventures, engaged in restoring the 300-year dead Commonwealth of Planets

We continue our catch up of out-of-date SF DVDs during the summer dry season. Here we return to the universe of Captain Dylan Hunt of the starship Andromeda, and her crew, valiantly restoring the Commonwealth of Planets after its 300 year down-time. Clearly someone read my crewing level concerns , for this season we see a larger Commonwealth crew. I say "see", since they are strictly background fodder.

This season comprises arc stories interspersed with "planet of the week" stories. I've downgraded it slightly from the previous seasons -- I'm not sure if this is because it is genuinely worse, of if my standards have raised (although the latter seems unlikely), or if it just feels a bit dated (the CGI looks a bit clunky in places). There seem to be fewer ensemble episodes, and more "a Beka episode", "a Trance episode", and so on, than the previous season. It's all perfectly adequate mind candy (although I could do without the preachiness), but it's disappointing that serviceable mind candy gets 5 seasons, whereas much better stuff gets so much less.

Anyway, two further seasons remain on the unwatched shelf. We'll get round to watching them during the next dry period in TV and DVD SF, but I'm not precisely champing at the bit.

Rating: 4
[ unmissable | great stuff | worth watching | mind candy | waste of time | unfinishable ]

reviewed 3 September 2011