The Primevals is more than a love letter to the pulps of yesteryears. Here, the long production history must be noted before I can go into the review. Back in the late 60s, David Allen (who did the animation in Young Sherlock Holmes and Ghostbusters II) came up with the idea, and this stop-motion animator turned filmmaker had a lot of wonderful ideas which were ahead of its time. It’s tough to say if he knew of Erich von Däniken’s Chariots of the Gods and the theories he posed as it was published in 68, with translations not necessarily emerging until a year or two later.
It probably doesn’t matter. Sadly, to get this movie made back then was tough. That was partially due to how the studio system worked and other politics that held this project back.
While much of this story was filmed back in the late 80s, the project was shelved and this individual’s untimely passing meant it’d never get finished. Thankfully, his work with Chris Endicott, Charles Band and Full Moon Studios meant that everything that was done got carefully warehoused. It wasn’t until 2018 that the team sought crowdfunding in order to finish this project. Other talents volunteered their time as this idea shouldn’t be lost to history too.