Sam Niell, Sean Bean and Ackland Find NBC's Crusoe

Sounds like a Lost rip off. Unless Lost is a rip off of this? I didn't read the book or see any movies of this so I'm not sure. But the whole "flashback to tell a back story of why the character is the way they are" is half of what Lost is all about. So if there weren't any flashbacks in the book than I'd say they were ripping off the idea and might get people comparing the two shows. Which can be bad.

I was completely disinterested in this idea until now. Fantastic casting. I'm still not excited about this, but I'm more willing to give it a chance now.

As far as the flashbacks, I'd say it's necessary whether they were contained in the book or not. Otherwise, you'd have one guy sitting on an island by himself, and it would be a pretty boring show.

Yeah. But then they'd be ripping off 'Cast Away' LOL

What I was trying to say was that when something good gets going on TV there is usually one or two more show that try to capture some of it's spotlight. And then tank.

'Lost' wasn't the first TV series to use flashbacks to provide exposition and extra drama, either. Flashbacks have been an integral part of every incarnation of 'Highlander', even the successful ones. I'm sure there are other instances, as well.

Defoe didn't use flashbacks as part of 'Robinson Crusoe,' but he also didn't use a lot of other literary devices, because they hadn't been invented yet. The book might have been rather more entertaining (to a 21st century audience, as though Defoe was writing for us) with flashbacks included, but I think it's enough that Defoe created the English novel to tell his story. We don't need to ask extra of him three hundred years later.

As for the use of flashbacks in the show, I think it might be the only way to give the series any kind of unified tone. If the showrunners tried to show Crusoe's life in the chronological order of the novel, you'd have a season where he's a slave in Africa, a second season where he's marooned, a third where he's a plantation owner in Brazil, a fourth where he's marooned again, and none of it would seem to have much to do with the pilot where he disappoints his upper middle-class father by going to sea in the first place. Using the flashbacks, they can attempt to unify the disparate episodes of Crusoe's life. Maybe it'll work.

If they're concentrating solely on the years with Friday, though, they're likely missing half the fun.

Captm0rgan,
echoing your thoughts, I posted this under the "NBC Unleashes Fall Premiere Dates" post before reading yours:

"Crusoe huh? It's got a seemingly deserted island you say? With flashbacks telling of the character's life prior to being stranded on the island? There are "other" people on the island? An actor from the Lord of The Rings is in the cast? Golly...I can't quite put my finger on it but this sounds very familiar...

(yeah yeah, I know...the story of Robinson Crusoe is older than the show I'm alluding to above.)"

But if they're doing it right like MightyJim thinks the story is going to be laid out in the flashbacks, it'll probably be good. Hopefully it's not set in the present day.