If nothing else, "The Curse of King Tut‘s Tomb" proves that the B-movie is alive and well.

When I was growing up in the Fifties, movie theaters always showed double features, with an A-movie often paired with a B-movie—a cheaper, lesser-quality production that served as a warm-up for the heavily advertised main feature. They were usually cheesy, they starred no-names or the kind of actors who‘d turn up on game shows in later years, and sometimes they were hard to sit through. But there were just enough interesting moments to keep you from hanging out in the lobby and causing trouble.

That‘s pretty much what "The Curse of King Tut‘s Tomb" is about. Though it‘s purportedly a "homage" to the Indiana Jones films, far too much is taken from that trilogy for it to be a tribute. It‘s more like a pale copy of the original, with liberal borrowings of concept, plot, characters, and even recognizable scenes. And don‘t be fooled by the title. Though it‘s set in the Twenties (more on that later) and the plot does turn on the discovery and opening of the boy-king Tutankhamen‘s tomb, it has nothing to do with the actual tomb opening that occurred in 1923, or the death of one of the expedition‘s patrons shortly thereafter. This TV mini-series is basically Indiana Jones meets Harry Potter, "The Wizard of Oz," and "Ghostbusters."

Casper Van Dien ("Sleepy Hollow") is Danny Fremont, a blander, more generic version of Indiana Jones who teaches classes, seeks archaeological artifacts of world-changing significance, wears that leather fedora and same outfit as Indy, and has a nemesis archaeologist who‘s after the same artifacts for evil purposes. But Van Dien isn‘t the actor that Harrison Ford is, and he seems too young and baby-faced for us to believe he‘s spent much time in the Egyptian sun looking for lost treasures, or that he‘s written a number of books on his archaeological exploits.

The past few years D