by MATTHEW HAYS

I suppose there was a certain intelligence to resurrecting a show like The Beachcombers, that long-running staple of Sunday night Canuck TV, some 12 years after the show went off the air.

After all, seeing as the rather clunky series, a quintessential bit of cornball Canadiana, was pretty bloody grim, it means the new series doesn’t have a whole lot to live up to. Don’t get me wrong, I used to watch the old series, but even as a kid I could see they’d skimped on their screenwriting budget, a nickle-and-diming that accounted for the lame plotlines and stooooopid jokes that revolved around the characters.

If striking the correct tone wasn’t too difficult—the yuks are all here, as well as the soapy storyline—finding a setup for the movie was. The three principals from the original series, Molly (Rae Brown), Nick (Bruno Gerussi) and Relic (Robert Clothier) are all dead, of course, and so one of the original series’ creators, Marc Strange, screenwrites up a new triangle. A love mesh, as luck would have it, that involves a young man (Cam Bancroft) who has returned to Gibsons Landing after years travelling Europe on his motorcycle, and two young women (Deanna Milligan and Kendall Cross) who effectively become the town’s Betty and Veronica.

In true computer-generated-screenplay form, the central conflict arises over Molly’s Reach, the café/resto that served as the original series’ main setting. It seems some nasty developers want to tear it down, and—the suspense was so extreme I can barely contain myself as I’m writing this—the wrecking ball comes this close to knocking the old place down. There are flashbacks (though not too many as fees for clips of the old series can prove mighty costly), maudlin moments over bad music and (naturally) a reprieve for Molly’s Reach.

This amounts to less a sequel than a pilot. Clearly, the folks behind this thing want to use it to launch a new series. Bring it on, I say. Really, I had to grow up with this insufferable cheese, why should the next generation be spared it? :

The New Beachcombers airs Monday, Nov. 25 at 8pm on CBC

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