The pilot opens with a real bang: We find ourselves at the mall parking lot, where a massive, savage Gorgonopsid - razor claws and great big pointy teeth - is chasing a terrified woman.
When reports come in that a giant lizard monster is loose in the woods near the mall, evolutionary zoologist Nick Cutter (Douglas Henshall) decides to investigate.
Cutter, whose wife disappeared eight years earlier and is presumed dead, assembles an ad hoc team, which features the prof's chick-magnet lab tech, Stephen Hart (James Murray); one of his more socially inept grad students, Connor (Andrew-Lee Potts); and Abby, a laid-off zoo worker and reptile lover they meet in the woods. (She's played by the delightfully impish former pop starlet Hannah Spearritt.)
Cutter & Co. discover that prehistoric creatures have been going back and forth from their time, 300 million years ago, to ours through a strange shimmering portal in the middle of the woods.
Soon, portals - and more nasty lizards, creepy critters, and hungry, gazillion-pound sharks - start appearing across London, taking our dino-busters, now guarded by a special forces commando unit, from one sighting to the next. There's gunfire, and some gruesome deaths. And great creature effects. But above all, Primeval is a delight to watch because of the great chemistry between its main characters and its inventive story lines.
Subsequent episodes explore the government's attempts to manipulate the dino-busters for its own Machiavellian plots. There's also a creepy and emotionally raw reunion in store for Cutter.
Contact Tirdad Derakhshani at 215-854-2736 or tirdad@phillynews.com.
Television
Primeval
9 tonight on BBC America, available locally on Comcast Digital Cable (Channel 114), via satellite on DIRECTV (Channel 264) and Echostar's DISH Network (Channel 135).
