Treasure Island Sky 1

On New Year’s Day and January 2^nd Treasure Island was shown on Sky 1.  I was really looking forward to this show because the trailers looked really good.  Now I have to admit that I have never read the book so I didn’t really know the whole story before watching.  That I feel should not have been a problem at all but I found that I seemed to be missing things along the way.

The first episode started off well with the whole story of why Long John Silver only has one leg and why they need to get to the island.  The problems started shortly after this.  Now that we were off the boat there was an inn or a tavern place.  This is where we meet Jim the boy we saw in the trailers.  Now in stumbles one of the pirates from the opening scene but if they told us how long after the whole ship scene this is I missed that.

Anyway the pirate is staying at the inn that Jim and his Mother own.  He seemed a bit mad and people try to kill him.  They don’t really tell us why he is there or why Jim is so buddy, buddy with him either.  In the end I found his death a bit anticlimactic.  

In the first episode the story progression was kind of slow but does pick up near the end.  Now this may just be the way the story is or a ploy to get us to watch the second part.  To me the second part of the miniseries was better than the first.  That could have been because more was happening and the first episode was to build up the characters and story line.  

While the story was a bit slow I have to say that the acting was rather good.  Eddie Izzard did a really good job as Long John Silver.  He was bad but in a way that you could still see him as good, if that makes any sense.  The way he portrayed the different sides of the character was excellent as he moved from being the manipulative pirate to the cook and friend that Jim likes.  

I had never heard of Toby Regbo before but he was actually a very good Jim.  The fact that he was able to show how Jim goes from a naive young man to someone who knows what’s going on was unbelievable.  Unfortunately the character himself often annoyed me but I can’t fault Toby Regbo for his performance. 

Elijah Wood was as usual brilliant in his portrayal of Ben Gunn.  My one problem was that he simply wasn’t in the show enough.  Each time I see Elijah Wood I notice how versatile as an actor he is.  At first Ben Gunn is just a follower but when we see him next he is a little crazy from spending way too much time alone.  I didn’t know that Elijah Wood could pull crazy off so well.

The other cast members were also very good.  Philip Glenistter played Captain Smollent very well.  He captured what it would be like to be a captain on this kind of mission.  Rupert Penry-Jones was unbelievable as Squire Trelawney.  He really got the whole better than you attitude and the decent into insanity that this character seemed to go through.  

All in all the show was okay.  I feel the slow pace of the story may have let it down a bit but then maybe the book is like this as well.  The cast was magnificent and really captured the emotions of the characters.