99
Lost in Space (1998) on VHS: Peak ’90s Cheese
(media.piefed.social)
Today’s VHS pick is Lost in Space (1998)—one of those 90s Hollywood stabs at turning 60s TV shows into blockbuster spectacles.
The cast is stacked: Gary Oldman, William Hurt, Matt LeBlanc, Mimi Rogers, Heather Graham. For a movie this goofy, it’s still wild that they roped in so much star power.
Critics trashed it at release, but over time it’s carved out a cult following.
The original series had them jumping to a random place in the universe every episode, if I recall correctly. It was pretty campy and cheesy, peak sci-fi for the 60s.
The movie was kind of an origin movie, shows a single bad jump that got them completely lost and they're in a single place trying to deal with it.
I never watched the full reboot series but it was sort of like the movie from what I remember, but drawn out over multiple episodes/seasons?
They all follow the same premise: a family and some other folks are on a ship, ship's "hyperjump" or whatever system is messed up so they can jump through space but they can't navigate so they're jumping blindly trying to get back home. Has the iconic DANGER WILL ROBINSON - DANGER robot, etc.
Movie was great imo.
Can't really get into the old series, it's like all the worst parts of the original outer limits but worse, with less of the great parts. The original Twilight Zone was in a similar vein but the episodes had more mind bendy plots ala Black Mirror, so that carries it past the camp in the modern era, but original LIS series was just like a star trek precursor or something. Probably great for its time but unless you're into that kind of thing it doesn't hold up well.
New series seemed good but for some reason my attention wandered and I never finished it. Plan to go back and watch it again someday though, I have a soft spot for the series because of the movie and I'm really glad they did a reboot. Similar to Battlestar Galactica, the original material was super dated but a really good candidate for a reboot.
The Netflix series takes itself more seriously, and the episodes usually end in sciencey solutions, rather than the Star Warsey action of the movie.
The '60s show actually took itself pretty seriously at the very start, but quickly swung into pure camp instead. I don't know if they figured out that's what people were actually watching it for, or if they just thought it was the best way to distinguish themselves from Star Trek, who they were competing with.