You Can Have the Robot I’ll Take John

Lost in Space (Netflix 2018)

Grade: B

It’s extremely rare for me these days to finish a series at all not to mention in a couple of weeks. Lost in Space tells the story of the Robinson family crash landed on an alien planet and trying to survive along with a questionable Doctor Smith and a friendly (sort of) robot. I should say I’ve never seen the original show though I vaguely remember seeing the film remake a couple of years back.

I went into this with reasonable expectations and wound up quite enjoying it.

Big points for the cast which was my main reason for giving it a try.

I love Molly Parker and Toby Stephens (especially bearded and kind of grumpy) who star as John and Maureen. They work really well together and have nice chemistry. I could look at them and think married couple through good and bad times.

All three children were fine. I especially wound up loving Penny (Mina Sundwall) she’s kind of the “normal” Robinson full of spunk and a little bit snarky. Also she wants to be the first author in space which I loved. (Maybe on a random planet I could get something done writing wise.) They did a good job with a sense of family especially where mom and dad were having problems. A bit of bickering and sibling stuff perhaps but I got the sense they cared and loved each other.

Really the whole of the supporting cast was fine to enjoyable.

Will did annoy me at times especially as the show went on. He does something in one of the episodes that annoyed the crap out of me.

The robot and most of the show looked really good. Honestly, I wasn’t expecting that but noticed that the first two episodes were directed by Neil Marshall who did (amongst other things) The Battle of Blackwater in Game of Thrones season two (and told the perv producer story.) And the last one was done by David Nutter who has directed some of the bigger Thrones episodes.

I also liked Parker Posey as Doctor Smith.

That being said some of her stuff got old after awhile and they didn’t seem to know what to do with her. I’m not sure if I would call her the villain of the series or just someone who would do what it took to survive. She also a had some mannerisms and tics for the character that got kind of old quick though some of her stuff with Parker in the last couple of episodes really saved that for me.

And as good as somethings looked…

The “bigger” alien effects like large creatures as well as some of the natural disasters happening on the planet really didn’t look that great. But hey, they did what they could and I was still impressed.

There were a couple of times I got romantic vibes from Don (Ignacia Serricchio) and Judy Robinson (Taylor Russell) which was weird because of the age difference. The actress is 24 I believe but the character is only supposed to be 18 and looks it to me. It didn’t go anywhere this season and I liked them both but I’m just not sure about that one…

It also didn’t help that she pouted a couple of times to get him to do what she wanted.

Issues aside the show was enjoyable and fast enough. It ends with a pretty big and interesting cliffhanger and I’m back for season 2 when they put it out.

Apparently people on the Internet are hot for the robot. I make no judgment- well, honestly I think the robot is more understandable than Pennywise or Venom. But you all can keep him and I’ll make sure John is okay 🙂

Recommend: Yes. It’s a fun summer show with a first-rate cast and a lot of potential.