National Treasure: Edge of History

Disney once again ruins a franchise....instead of giving us a sequel to Book of Secrets,they give us a crappy show with terrible actors and crap story...who is in charge with Disney entertainment because they need to be fired...

At least they could have tried to get Nicolas Cage or any of the original cast besides Harvey Keitel.

This is definitely one show to skip and keep your fingers crossed that they'll do a sequel movie with Nicolas Cage because he needs a hit movie since most of his movies are horrible now.

Lately Disney has had a lot of misses with the quality of their movies and that's a shame.

This definitely feels like a CW show, but not necessarily in a bad way. It still has a lot of the charm of the original, albeit without Nic Cage, Sean Bean, or Diane Kruger lending their charisma. Some of the clues and character decisions are cheesey, but so were the ones in the original movies. The historical references are...dubious, but again so were the ones in the original movies. Some of the dialogue is over the top, but not irredeemably so. They also got several actors from the movies to lend their talents, which is nice.

Overall despite a few drawbacks it's a fun romp, and definitely more enjoyable than Peacock's "The Lost Symbol," which I felt kind of lost the charm of the movies it was based on.

I've got through the first two episodes, find it interesting enough. Realize this IS NOT going to be extravagant like the movies, and slower burn as it's a series. It has no more plot devices than the movies either, so don't hang on that withering piece of fruit from other reviewers...

On to the review.

First episode is getting to know Jess and her friend Tess. Setup is on par with Laura Croft IMO, makes sense for this type of character. I think she's a little too curious, too quickly but they have to start somewhere. Love that, just like in the movies, she's taking in info, looking for clues, acting on them, stuff happens. A pleasant cameo by a certain master mason from movies is a great touch. I'm looking forward to seeing how the world building progresses, story unfolds, and treasures to be found.

This series is actually very enjoyable if you can get over one glaring problem. Every 10 min the writers felt they needed to make a social justice comment. The characters constantly spew out irrelevant and non-sensical statements about racism, poverty, indigenous issues, LGTBQ issues, feminist, etc, etc, etc. That's all and fine but they make no sense to the story or the series. They are just there hanging out like a big zit on their nose. Could they not just make a National Treasure story? It was compelling and exciting. The characters were well developed. But I suspect that one of the new "diversity" producers or writers got to the script and simply added all this nonsense. It really does take away from the series and is a major reason it was not renewed.

I normally do not feel the need to review something, but with how many negative reviews are on here, I do. All of these Negative Nancy's were expecting the show to be JUST like the movie when a show and a movie are two different kinds of artistic interpretation. We knew it wouldn't have the old characters to the extent that the movies did and that it would include newer characters.

That being said, I am actually thoroughly enjoying not only the acting of the main college-aged cast, but also the diversity within it. The only character/actor that I am not enjoying in this is Catherine's character, Billie.

It's not meant to feel like the movies, because it's not a movie. It's a TV show with MUCH younger characters than that of the original duology, which WILL make an impact on the feel of the show.

It has the history and it has the puzzles. It may show it in a different way, but guess what? It's been 15 years, which mean technology is also being used differently, but that doesn't and shouldn't mean it's bad every time.

If you loved the movies, give this series a shot and make the decision for yourself. Don't listen to all the naysayers.