inexorabletruth
2018-05-08, 12:53 PM
After binging Into the Badlands at a rate that I can only describe as "unhealthy" my hunger for martial arts series' was not sated, so I checked New Legend of Monkey, because Monkey King lore is awesome!
Then, I saw episode one. The plot was thin enough to make my right eye twitch. The acting was about what you'd expect at a LARP, and the special effects were better the first time when it was called Hercules: The Legendary Journeys.
Then there were the fight... scene? I mean... there were technically fight scenes, but really you just see the demon thrust out his hand, and then they cut to a reaction scene, a flash of light, and then a mook fly away, obviously hurt by the... spell? So there was only one where you actually get to see two white dudes clumsily slapping their weapons at each other.
At one point, Jared Blakiston apparently swipes too fast, so he has to stand there for a second to wait for Chai Hansen to "deflect" the swipe, and not only do they not edit this scene out, but it's actually a close up. And what adds insult to injury is that Jared Blakiston actually knows martial arts, and they could be making much better use of that ability, rather than smear feces all over the scene with bad editing, ridiculous dialog, and campy special effects.
The whole thing is cringe worthy, but that's ok, because cornball chop socky flicks can be awesome in their own bizarre way. But the series feels awkwardly white-washed... or at least not Chinese, to be more specific. I don't know why this bothers me, but it does. Sun Wukong is 16th century Chinese lore, and I feel like he should remain that way. Even if the rest is clumsily anachronistic. After all, he was preserved in a statue for 500 years according to the series' own lore. Why would he talk like Keanu Reeves in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventures?
My love for the genre makes me want to give this series another try, but from what I've seen so far, I hesitate, because I don't want to put myself through an entire season of this. So, I'd like to probe the minds of the Playground and see what you think before I press on to episode 2. Am I crazy? Am I nitpicking too much? Or is this series the remorseless garbage fire I suspect it of being?
Then, I saw episode one. The plot was thin enough to make my right eye twitch. The acting was about what you'd expect at a LARP, and the special effects were better the first time when it was called Hercules: The Legendary Journeys.
Then there were the fight... scene? I mean... there were technically fight scenes, but really you just see the demon thrust out his hand, and then they cut to a reaction scene, a flash of light, and then a mook fly away, obviously hurt by the... spell? So there was only one where you actually get to see two white dudes clumsily slapping their weapons at each other.
At one point, Jared Blakiston apparently swipes too fast, so he has to stand there for a second to wait for Chai Hansen to "deflect" the swipe, and not only do they not edit this scene out, but it's actually a close up. And what adds insult to injury is that Jared Blakiston actually knows martial arts, and they could be making much better use of that ability, rather than smear feces all over the scene with bad editing, ridiculous dialog, and campy special effects.
The whole thing is cringe worthy, but that's ok, because cornball chop socky flicks can be awesome in their own bizarre way. But the series feels awkwardly white-washed... or at least not Chinese, to be more specific. I don't know why this bothers me, but it does. Sun Wukong is 16th century Chinese lore, and I feel like he should remain that way. Even if the rest is clumsily anachronistic. After all, he was preserved in a statue for 500 years according to the series' own lore. Why would he talk like Keanu Reeves in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventures?
My love for the genre makes me want to give this series another try, but from what I've seen so far, I hesitate, because I don't want to put myself through an entire season of this. So, I'd like to probe the minds of the Playground and see what you think before I press on to episode 2. Am I crazy? Am I nitpicking too much? Or is this series the remorseless garbage fire I suspect it of being?