This show tried to take a different road from most. A story of a family who fell through a "hole" into an alternate reality, it took that premise in directions that most have never tried. It contained some of the most sophisticated writing that science fiction television had seen up to that time, with a deceptive subtlety couched in satire. Part allegory, part drama, part family, with frequent "winks" to the audience (characters spouting lines that seem to convey that they know more than they are supposed to, but the lines that follow add a more consistent context). CBS never knew how to promote it. "Rock and Roll Suicide" (in which the kids -- stuck in a place where the entertainment is REALLY boring -- invent rock and roll) is a sociological commentary on non-conformance with several stabs at dogmatic religion (the Church of Artificial Intelligence to be precise). "Mansion of the Beast" is essentially a retelling of that fairy tale. The show is not completely successful. Series television is inevitably a crap shoot. You try your best. But its fresh outlook, intelligent scripting, and tongue-in-cheek humor put it a cut above most. It deserved more of a chance. Also, although the episodes as they ran on the Sci-Fi channel were deftly cut, some of the humor was lost. Pity. I recently learned that there are 5 episodes that never aired. Let's bring this one out on DVD with the missing episodes included.
Review of Otherworld
