Re-Imagined "V" gets 3.5 stars in USA Today

[NewJeffCT]

I'm looking forward to it - I love the new short-haired Morena Baccarin in the Jane Badler role... odd - it's going to be 4 episodes on now, then it won't be on again until March. Taking a page out of the Battlestar Galactica book, maybe?

When you're on a roll, even your more dubious plans have a way of panning out.

There's no doubt that, creatively, ABC is playing network TV's hottest hand. It has launched fall's best new sitcoms in The Middle, Modern Family and Cougar Town, and its most intriguing drama in FlashForward. And now it can add to that list of achievements the season's most entertaining new hour, straightforward division: V.

Think about how easily this idea could have gone south. Apply too little creative thought, and this souped-up updating of NBC's much-loved 1983 miniseriescould easily have become the same cheesy, tacky rehash mess that NBC made of Knight Rider. Overthink the project, and you risk bleeding all the fun out of it and creating an overly dark lump like Bionic Woman.

Tonight, writer Scott Peters, whose The 4400 was one of TV's best recent alien-invasion dramas, hits all the right chords. He adds just enough modern media twists and political/sleeper-cell parallels to contemporize the story without drowning it in paranoia. The clothes and hair have changed, no doubt for the better, but the essentials are all in place – including, we can only hope, the visitors' legendary fondness for hamsters.

http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/reviews/2009-11-03-Vpreview03_ST_N.htm