Saturday Morning Cult-TV Blogging: Land of the Lost (1991 - 1992): "Sorceress's Apprentice" (November 28, 1992)

In “Sorceress’s Apprentice,” the sorceress Keela (Adilah Barnes) gives Annie her spell book for safe keeping. 

Alas, Kevin also wants to use the book’s magical powers and tries to steal it from his sister.  Mr. Porter warns Kevin to quit it, but soon Kevin enlists Stink’s help in the task.

Later, Shung -- leader of the renegade Sleestaks -- gets his hands on Keela’s valuable grimoire and transforms Mr. Porter into a turtle. 

Annie gets the book back, and must practice her own magic to restore her imperiled father.

When Keelah finally returns to claim her spell book, the sorceress informs Annie that using such magic properly takes years of practice….

If you’ve been reading my reviews of the 1990s Land of the Lost the previous couple of weeks, you’ll understand why I write now that I’ve all but given up on the series. 

“Sorceress’s Apprentice” provides no reason for restored faith. The story is more aptly a situation comedy than a fantasy adventure, and once more the use of magic goes thoroughly unexplored. Magic is just a gimmick here, a vehicle for comedy moments like Annie turning Kevin’s hair a bright red, or Dad being transformed into Kevin.

Sadly, Keela never explains how the magic of her world operates in the Land of the Lost. We never know the source of the magic, and in many cases, Annie doesn’t even seem to be reading from the spell book while performing the magic. Instead she just says nonsense words and magical things miraculously happen.  It’s all like a first grader’s idea of casting spells.

The whole idea of magic in “Sorceress’s Apprentice” is totally unexplored and so Keela’s line that “there are rules” for it is laughable. This episode establishes no such rules, or even the groundwork for rules.  Here, it looks like anyone -- Annie, Kevin, or Shung -- can cast spells simply and easily, without study, without preparation, without, even, gathering ingredients for them.

Instead, the episode wants to teach a lesson about responsibility. Annie must use the magic responsibly, if she hopes to master it. That’s not a bad message, but it doesn’t exactly work with all the comedy pratfalls and jokes.

Meanwhile, Timothy Bottoms has effectively become a guest-star on his own series, and Mr. Porter appears only briefly here to talk to Kevin sternly, and to get transformed into (in order), a turtle, Stink, Kevin, and the Cyclops nemesis of Keela. 

Once more, there is no reason given for the fact that Annie causes these transformations while trying to restore her Dad to his original form.  It just happens, and is supposed to be funny…but isn’t.

Still, at least this episode has some threat, in the form of Shung. Like Kevin, he wants to possess the spell book and so makes some trouble for the Porters.  

The next episode of the series, “Misery Loves Company” doesn’t offer even that much.