Iron Fist - 2017 (Netflix)
Luke Cage - 2016 (Netflix)
The Marvel Netflix shows to date have been generally quite good,
though not flawless. They are built for binge watching, featuring
storylines that propel you through the series, instilling a desire to consume the story as fast as possible. As I've noted with
Daredevil seasons
1 &
2 and
Jessica Jones
there tends to be lag periods late in each run as the showrunners have
to draw out their ongoing plots over 13 episodes leading to a few draggy
episodes along the way. It seemed that the Netflix crew had been
slowly solving this as they go, with season 2 of
Daredevil and
Luke Cage
both featuring enough engaging diversions and side-tracks that there
were less holding patterns and more character movement (if not always
story movement). But
Iron Fist, sadly, feels like it's almost
completely comprised of holding patterns. Where the other Netflix shows
felt like ten episodes of story drawn out over thirteen parts,
Iron Fist feels like a movie's worth of story painfully stretched over it's 12 and a half hour run time.
Iron Fist
makes too painfully aware the fact that these Netflix series don't have
much sense of fun in them. They're self-serious to a fault, as a
result, the flaws become more pronounced, and tend to linger in the mind
more than the positive aspects. Iron Fist doesn't need time to let the
flaws float to the forefront, they're glaringly obvious from the
beginning. Blase acting, wildly erratic characterization, tragically predictable (and direly boring) story threads, sub-par martial arts
choreography, lazy production values, and a total lack of defining
aesthetic. Where
Iron Fist fails most of all though is in a completely uncompelling and unconvincing lead.
Finn Jones (late of
Game of Thrones) took a lot of shit when the casting for the show came out. There was pre-casting hope that
Iron Fist
would deviate from its "white savior" origins to feature an actor of
Asian descent in the lead, a direction they obviously didn't go with. There would
have been many great reasons for this type of proactive switch, chief of
which would be putting an Asian character as the leading man of a
high-profile series where he's the hero and also the romantic lead,
something actors of Asian descent rarely get to do in American
entertainment. There's really only two reasons not to do it, one being
that Iron Fist is traditionally white (a poor excuse in any book) and
the other being that his being a white guy is necessary for the story.
To be painfully honest (and I stress the
painfully
here), having a white actor play Danny Rand -- a whiny, mopey,
petulant, spoiled rich kid who managed to steal a great power from a
true champion and then abscond with it for his own petty reasons (it's
white entitlement to the Nth degree) -- was kind of necessary for the
story being told here. It would be less convincing if an Asian actor were in
the role...not that such an actor couldn't pull off spoiled, rich and
entitled, but I would go as far as to say, for the story they're telling
here, it's rather crucial that Danny is white. At the end of the
season, it becomes clear that Danny's outsider status in K'un Lun and his selfish
nature, his personal crusade and his lack of responsibility aren't
positive character traits, and despite being sage and wise, the leaders
of K'un Lun almost certainly made a mistake in choosing Danny as Iron
Fist. In the show, Danny said he wanted the role of Iron Fist simply to
take it, which just screams white entitlement from the mountaintops. He earned it, but he also literally
took it. The role of Iron Fist is meant to be protector of K'un Lun and
Danny abandoned his post almost immediately, like Indiana Jones
stealing the ingot at the start of
Raiders of the Lost Ark and running like mad to escape with it to the "civilized world".
That all said, he's not a very likeable character, and the direction the showrunners chose to go with him, at
almost
every turn, seemed a misstep. The colonialism analogy they perhaps sought to exploit is
never adequately dealt with. On top of that, Finn Jones clearly doesn't
have much of a sense of who this character should be or what his
motivations are scene to scene. He speaks most of the time in a
whispery growl that conceals any real acting skill or emotion. He
pouts, he whines, he gets angry, and mostly just looks confused, but
Jones portrays these with only surface level acting. There's no sense
of conflict, no sense of awareness of a man who has had fifteen years of
training in meditative and martial arts. Jones and the scriptwriters' portrayal of Danny Rand is almost child-like, as if he were still the
11-year-old who crashed in the Himalayas and were frozen in time, then
came back to reality with a certain set of skills but no emotional
growth or wisdom. Naive and juvenile, particularly in Jones' hands . Somehow the badass Colleen Wing (
Jessica Henwick) falls in love with him. Deep into the show's run, Jones started to remind me of
Hayden Christiansen
as Anakin Skywalker in the Star Wars prequels. He was a young actor
who likewise didn't have a sense of who his character was beyond the
surface level emotions and wasn't given much guidance in delivering his
lines convincingly. On top of that, Jones' physical performance certainly doesn't smack of
someone who's really trying to give it their all.
What the other Netflix shows had that
Iron Fist does not is a solid supporting cast. Here, beyond Colleen Wing, our main supporting cast is the Meachum family. Ward (
Tom Pelphrey, channeling Eric Roberts like no man should) and Joy (
Jessica Stroup, given the most inconsistent character in the show) were Danny's best friends as a child, while their father, Harold (
Lord of the Rings'
David Wenham
attempting - but failing - at scenery chewing), was Danny's father's
partner and best friend. Ward and Joy now run the Rand business and are
threatened by Danny's return. Harold died from cancer shortly after
Danny and his family "died" in a plane crash, but was resurrected by the
Hand (sworn enemy of K'un Lun) and has been in hiding for 15 years,
manipulating Ward and Rand Industries from the shadows. These threads
do all fold together, and would be satisfying in a more compressed
format. Dragged out as they are they feel inessential, to the point that
Ward and Joy seem to have their own story operating independently from
Danny's which just feels like filler. Claire Temple (
Rosario Dawson) and Jeri Hogarth (
Carrie Ann Moss)
both return from other shows, and their characters, having been
previously defined by better showrunners, breathe some life into this
staid cast (Clare has a particularly good rapport with Colleen). But still
Jones tends to suck the air completely out of most of the scenes around
him (though he has the odd moment where it seems like he accidentally gets
something across effectively, mostly when partnered with Henwick).
It seems clear well before the halfway point of the series that Danny Rand a supporting character neither charming nor
compelling enough to hold the lead (he's the
Joey of
the Defenders group of
Friends).
The
show features dueling clashing soundtracks, with an 80's-inspired synth
score and title sequence that seem stolen almost directly from
Tron Legacy,
and a hip hop soundtrack mix from 2002 that I find hard to believe
11-year-old Danny would actually have listened to. It takes on some
dumb relevance between Danny and Colleen, but I think is hamfistedly
meant to presuppose a kinship with Luke Cage, you know... because rap. Both
soundtracks are actually highlights of the show, but neither fit the story or its themes or characters well.
The fight
choreography is an uneven mix. Jones evidently didn't learn martial
arts to any great degree (the fact that I long for a Keanu Reeves caliber performance here is painful to me) and it shows even to the untrained
eye. His movements scream "poseur", inauthentic and flawed. His fighting is slow and sloppy and the camerawork fails to make up
for it with lots of distance shots, quick cuts and inserts, and bad body
doubling. Henwick is a lot more adept at fighting, and her fight
sequences easily outshine any others on the show. Episode 12 features Colleen in a duel in the rain that is one of few highlights in the show. While Episode 8 features another, with Danny in a fight (hood-up for stuntperson) against a "drunken master" (played by a thoroughly charming
Lewis Tan -- who could have made a great Danny in a much different iteration of this show [and
I just learned he was close to actually being such] -- shows he has some impressive action chops, but when your comparison in drunken mastering is always going to be
Jackie Chan, you're always going to come up short).
Iron Fist isn't
necessarily unwatchable, but it's vastly substandard compared to what's
come before in Marvel's Netflix offerings. That it visually makes
actual New York City look like Vancouver standing in for New York City
is telling. It doesn't take advantage of its setting in any meaningful
way and never doesn't feel like a 90's syndicated, made-in-Canada genre
program.
Compare
Iron Fist to
Luke Cage, Marvel/Netflix's previous entry in their
Defenders set-up. Luke was introduced in
Jessica Jones
as a love interest with a haunted past. He was an ace supporting
character who, like Danny Rand, has some difficulty being the lead of
his own show. However where
Iron Fist fails in support cast and style,
Luke Cage delivers.
Luke Cage is rife with supporting players, from
Simone Missick's defining role as police detective
Misty Knight, to Mahershala Ali's breakout performance as mob boss
Cottonmouth (which alone deserved an acclaim, his later
Moonlight Oscar-win a just reward for the nerds in the crowd), to
Alfre Woodard's Black Mariah, to
Theo Rossi's Shades, to
Ron Cephas Jones's ever lurking performance as Bobby Fish, to
Frank Whaley as Misty's corrupt partner Scarfe (erm, spoiler) and
Erik LaRay Harvey just chewing scenery as Diamondback (and lest we forget
Frankie Faison
as the inspirational Pop and the requisite Claire Temple intervention
with Rosario Dawson). While Luke Cage feels a little neutered compared
to his comic book counterpart (in the comics Cage is much more aggro
while
Mike Coulter's Cage is more hesitant and reflective) and
perhaps too conservative and even a little dull, the supporting cast brighten
everything up around him.
The show has style in spades,
a vibrant neon palette with yellow, blue and pink washes that hearken
to a four-colour world while stepping outside of any comic book
confines. Of all the Marvel Netflix shows,
Luke Cage is its most playful, going bigger and broader in its storytelling, as a reflection of it's big and broad title character.
Another
stylish aspect -- one which practically makes the series -- is its
soundtrack. There's an impeccable score by the team-up of composer
Adrian Younge and hip-hop producer extraordinaire Ali Shaheed Muhammad
but that's not even what I'm referring to.
Luke Cage incorporates a host of amazing live performances from
Raphael Siddiq, Jidenna, Charles Bradley, Faith Evans, Method Man (who also acts as himself against Luke Cage in a cameo) and
Sharon Jones
and the Dap Kings all to an utterly compelling effect. It sets a
scene, provides mood and atmosphere, and formidably entertains.
Cottonmouth's club in the show gets used (and abused) an awful lot, but
few shows have so effectively used a single set to such an extent.
Unlike
the other Netflix Marvel shows, which try to tell one large arc with a
few small diversions,
Luke Cage as a season is practically cut in half as a result
of the two distinct key opponents Luke faces in Cottonmouth and
Diamondback (Black Mariah rounds out this iteration of Marvel's Serpent
Society and is a constant fixture of more subtle manipulation) and is
better off for it.
Luke Cage more than any of these series
embraces his comic book origins, most specifically in the episode
detailing the origin of Luke's powers. It's gaudy and goofy and silly
in a way these Netflix shows otherwise direly try to avoid or temper, as such it feels
drastically out of place, but at the same time it's just so unabashedly
wonderful and, dare I say it, fun. Likewise the flashbacks for Mariah
and Cottonmouth embrace a Blaxploitation aesthetic, while still
providing real gravitas and meaning for the characters. Luke is a
massive, super-strong, virtually indestructible hero, so it makes sense
some of his opponents would use external factors (like friends, family,
loved ones, Luke's secrets) in combating him, while others would find
technological ways of fighting him. Even still, Luke's own worst enemy
in his show is his reticence to fight, to expose himself, to commit to
his cause. The self doubt angle isn't a bad one for a show about a man
who can't be hurt, but it's something Luke Cage in the comics doesn't
seem to face, and therefore feels antithetical to eat up so much real
estate in the show.
Beyond being the most lively Marvel Netflix product,
Luke Cage also arrived at a very important time. During a rash of young black men being needlessly shot an killed by police across the United States and the resulting Black Lives Matter movement, a powerful, proactive, bulletproof black man became instantly iconic. The show seemed to have some trepidation in having Cage face off against police, and when they did do it, they didn't go too overtly topical with it. But within the show, they acknowledge the symbolism of Luke Cage (Method Man does a live rap about it), and it feels good, it feels hopeful and inspiring. Again, it's only slightly disappointing that Luke is so hesitant a hero and so congenial compared to his comic book counterpart.
As I noted, these Netflix shows
aren't flawless. Luke Cage's worst folly is actually the fight
sequences, which are almost all clumsy and clunky. Luke is a bull
tearing through a china shop, and that gracelessness shows in almost
every fight. Where the show's talented directors excel in virtual every
facet, the way they shoot fight sequences is almost universally poor.
One particular moment keeps sticking in my mind, a shot of Mike Coulter
early in the series fumbling to find his grip on the sweater of a bad
guy extra firing a gun on a staircase above him. That this moment, part
of a longer sequence in the fight, remained in tact speaks to the
limitations of the budget of the show. The strive for longer, uncut
fight scenes was a good idea in theory, but without clever choreography, it
tends to get tedious and uninteresting fast. Cage's strength and
invulnerability could have been used much more creatively.
Of all the Netflix Marvel shows,
Luke Cage
is the one I want to revisit the most, primarily because of the live
performances but characters like Misty and Cottonmouth became instant
favourites. I still think
Jessica Jones has had the strongest season as a whole, but
Cage has so much more style.
