Luciaphil has already covered a lot of what I like and dislike about 1897 (as usual!).
As much as I'm looking forward to 1897, at the same time I'm dreading the present-day setup. I think it took a little too long, and focused a little too much on the children. Strangely, this is the case with each time-travel story line. It begins with the focus on the children in present day, yet once we actually travel back into the past, we see next to nothing of the kids. But I was pretty sick of the kids, in each instance, by the time they finally traveled into the past.
As Luciaphil has already pointed out, the 1897 episodes are usually outstanding, but the story line itself is the most inconsistent in the series, written day by day, seemingly with little planning. There are history revisions aplenty and I don't like seeing performers play more than one character within the same time line (KLS as Rachel & Kitty; Thayer David as Sandor and Petofi; Roger Davis as Wilkins and Tate, etc.). It is also unfortunate that both Joan Bennett and John Karlen both left the show for the majority of this time line. I also felt the end of the story was too focused on Petofi and got tired of him. They seemed like they were just dragging the whole thing out by the end of 1897 because they didn't know what to do next and didn't want to end a popular story line.
That being said, I can't wait for Nancy Barrett to play Charity possessed by Pansy Faye; and Joan Bennett really gets a chance to do some acting with the Judith character. I was very impressed with how much Bennett brought to the portrayal that obviously wasn't in the script. In fact, just about every performer has their best character in the 1897 time line, from John Karlen to Grayson Hall.
