So I was pleased to see they turned it into a tv series. With a great premise like that - what could go wrong?
Quite a lot as it happens.
I knew we were in trouble when the first scene featured a clunking great anachronism as Welles is urged to forget his work and try 'dating' - in 1897? - but things just get worse after that. Two personable but, to be frank, fairly uncharismatic young British actors are assigned the lead roles but the script doesn't really let them do anything but strike poses. The wit of the original film is replaced by a series of gags as the nineteenth century time travellers acquaint themselves (far too quickly and glibly) with 21st century technology. New York is substituted for the original setting but most of the film's original plot is recycled with enough tweaks to make sure there's more to come.
The leads look like they've been cast with a tweeny audience in mind. They're not ba-ad exactly but they do remind you painfully how great the originals were. David Warner, in particular, was far more chilling as The Ripper, a part he was born to play. The love interest too is now recast as a spunky modern gal who can throw a punch which completely changes the dynamics of the romantic sub-plot; especially as this Welles is a far wetter character than McDowell's.
And the time machine looks like a Victorian microwave - though, with my luck, someone will make a model of it.
