'The Time Traveler's Wife' turns the book into a time-killing HBO series

Adapted from the novel that became a not-particularly-memorable movie in 2009, "The Time Traveler's Wife" now transforms its bizarre love story into an HBO series. Rose Leslie and Theo James star, but in keeping with the time-travel rules that state there's no changing things or saving people, despite their heroics it's too late to salvage this handsome but uninvolving show.

James' Henry notes that time travel "just happens to me" at unexpected times -- a "genetic defect" that causes him to fall through time, leaving him "naked, penniless and running." He and Clare ("Game of Thrones'" Leslie) explain all this in direct-to-camera testimonials at different points in their lives, sort of like "The Office," just with more nudity.

Indeed, James' backside certainly gets oodles of exposure, in sometimes comical ways, as he flees the peculiar situations in which he finds himself. Yet the main gist of the series is its non-linear exploration of the arc of their relationship, which includes moments where Clare knows far more than Henry does, since the encounters she's referencing haven't happened to that version of him yet.