BlackGeekdom Science-Fiction from a Different Perspective

“Tin Man” is the Sci-Fi channel’s re-imagining L. Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz. I watched the first and second night of this three part miniseries. Sci-Fi promoted this series almost as much as Flash Gordon was promoted. That should have been my first warning. The second was Sci-Fi’s scheduling of the second night to run against Chuck and Heroes, which are two of the Sci-Fi channel’s target audience’s favorite shows, especially since these were the mid-season finales. Thankfully, Sci-Fi repeats their “television events” almost immediately after airing.

Briefly, the story follows D.G. (originally Dorothy Gale) who works a dead end job as a waitress dreaming of bigger and better things. We find out that she isn’t from this world but from another world called the O.Z. (Outer Zone) and that she is the key to saving it from an evil sorceress, Azkadellia (the Wicked Witch). She is joined on her journey down the old road by Glitch, a man who lost half his brain as a punishment for being a criminal, Raw, a cowardly beast with psychic abilities, and Cain, a former cop, known as tin men in the O.Z. We get the classic characters of munchkins, the Mystic Man (the Wizard) played by Richard Dreyfuss, and even the flying monkeys who spring from the cleavage of of Azkadellia. Literally.

The effects aren’t bad for a television series. Obviously, the network wanted this to be a success. The visuals are pretty good, despite the filter that the director, editor, or director of photography went with. What I mean is that everything seemed to be in perpetual early evening, an almost dusk. It’s a decent story for the most part, but it could have been done better. Many of the puns and allusions to the original story don’t have to be so blatant. Anyone watching has probably seen the Wizard of Oz dozens of times. I can do without lines like “If he only had a brain,” or “They’re off to see the Wizard.” Side note: It may not be suitable for your under 5 crowd, but that’s a parent’s call. There are hookers, a pimp, torture, some pretty gruesome scenes, and the Mystic Man is a drug addict who uses on screen. But I digress.

If you don’t have anything else to watch, especially with the writer’s strike, give this a shot. If you miss it, you won’t miss much. Rent The Wiz.

Two fists for making Toto a black man.

Posted under Movies, Television