Moon Knight D+

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

...and they even dropped it at the height of the Wolf Moon. Neat.

 

So, Marvel have adopted one of Walt Disney's earliest principles, in that kids want to laugh, cry, and have the the living **** scared out of them. It's not grimdark, it's glossyshinydark. And they've let Oscar give it the full beans. No scenery left unchewed...

 

Notes below:

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• I'm oddly excited for this one, as I've never read MK and know very little about the character(s).
• I do know that Marc Spector is the best-known of the personalities. But when we join the story in London, Marc ain't home...
• So awkward/gawky Steven Grant appears to be working at the British Museum, possibly in the gift shop.
• Which puts him three tube stops down the road from Kit Harington's Dane Whitman at the NHM.
• Ethan Hawke looking suitably creepy as a cult leader.
• Almost-respectable attempt at a British accent from Oscar. Not quite DIck Van Dyke territory, though weirdly flips between Cockney and Birmingham (yes, there's an entire city of 3.6m people who all sound like Ozzy.)

 

So, we like?

 

EDIT: incidentally, The Internet Being Undefeated and all that, someone's worked out where Steven's flat is.

It's on Queenstown Road in Battersea. 

And if you take a look on Street View...

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Edited January 18, 2022 by ThaOGDreamWeaver
sorry, I was hungry

[Frostbiter]

I'll be checking this one out, unlike The Eternals. Just saw a story that the actor playing Moon Knight, Gaspard Ulliel, died in a skiing accident yesterday. Not sure what that will mean for the series. Condolences to his family.

Edited January 19, 2022 by Frostbiter

[Mr. Vee]

It was the actor playing Midnight Man, but yeah still.

[The_Warpact]

  On 1/19/2022 at 4:21 PM, Frostbiter said:

I'll be checking this one out, unlike The Eternals. Just saw a story that the actor playing Moon Knight, Gaspard Ulliel, died in a skiing accident yesterday. Not sure what that will mean for the series. Condolences to his family.

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He also played a young Hannibal Lecter, in Hannibal Rising. Thats how I remember him, didn't know he was in this.

[Frostbiter]

  On 1/19/2022 at 4:46 PM, Mr. Vee said:

It was the actor playing Midnight Man, but yeah still.

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Thanks for the correction.

Edited January 19, 2022 by Frostbiter

[Shadow Raven]

As an old school Moon Knight fan, I'm hyped for this.

 

This could be a great show or just more of the same. I'm hoping for the former.

 

But, even at the risk of sounding like a fanboy, I always give great thanks for having these options. 

 

(sits in a rocking chair and pulls out pipe) Back in my day, all we had were reruns of that 1960s Fantastic Four Cartoon and Spier-Man and His Amazing Friends, there was Spider-Woman, but that almost unwatchable.

 

I'd never have thought I'd be hearing a grandma mention "Thanos,"

 

Good times!

[DougGraves]

I am also an old school Moon Knight fan and am excited that they seem to be doing old Moon Knight.  I was worried it would be Fist of Khonshu era.

 

I am hoping they finally do street level gritty in the fun MCU style.

[Techwright]

Moon Knight is one of the Marvel characters I know virtually nothing about.  My best friend (and former comic shop owner) had to fill me in.  The trailer looks electrifyingly trippy, and if the clips in it of Oscar Isaacs are any true indication, this is going to be an amazing performance. 

 

As to the accent...

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If I understand correctly, "Stephen" is one of his personalities in his disorder?  If so, that can serve as an in-story explanation of the decent but odd accent.  Its not normal but an affectation of his personality. 

 

Also, I thought I'd heard that in the comics "Stephen" is a very wealthy man.  Why have him working in a museum?

 

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

Following up on Techwright's spoiler... the answer is we don't know, and quite possibly neither does he. And that's great.

As I've wittered about before, the MCU is by canon its' own little Universe. And D+ writers have freedom to riff on and magpie-borrow from anything they like, but the brief is to write a story that works on film/TV. Comics are different with their own beats and ranges, not to mention info sidebars, captions and breakouts that wouldn't make sense much. (Ang Lee gave it a go.)

 

I have a feeling from a storytelling point of view they're going to drop viewers - both those who've read the books and who are completely new - in at the deep end, which works alongside Steven's own confusion at discovering his alters. Compartmentalisation is a thing in DID, and while "alters" aren't usually completely unaware of what the others do or their existence, if it's something that would emotionally or morally conflict with that alter's values, it can get safely tucked away so as not to cause distress.

 

[DougGraves]

The  more I see of this the less interested I am.  It seems like the goal is to make it confusing and tedious rather than a superhero show.  Maybe that's just hype and how they think they can sell it.  Grimmud is worse than grimdark.

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

So, our first episode - The Goldfish Problem, which neatly refers to both Steven's memory and an actual fish - has dropped.

 

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Good bits:

• It's not visually grimdark. If anything, it's movie-hyperreal: London's rarely looked this clean or pretty.
• On the "tedious" point: D+ have clearly learned that you can't leave the action till Episode 4, so we get dropped into a big sequence after about ten minutes (along with Steven literally dropping into it, who's suitably puzzled about what/where/why the hell things are happening but manages to survive. Just.)
• Before we know about Marc's existence, the "blackouts" are handled nicely.
• F Murray Abraham provides a suitable Voice Of (Angry/Sarcastic) God...
• ...but the absolute standout is Ethan Hawke's Arthur Harrow. If you're old enough to remember Hawke as a Brat Packer, that memory is going to get wiped.
• One of the things they've mentioned is trying to build mirror opposites into this show: so Hawke's placid, unflappable, almost gentle cult leader matches perfectly with Oscar's bundle of nerves. 
• The other mirror in that relationship is that while Grant is lost, alone and confused, Harrow has a plan, a tribe of followers who he considers friends, and the most dangerous thing of all... the absolute rock-solid conviction of a True Believer. Oh, and then there's his verrry creepy intro sequence, in which you can hear Chekhov quietly loading up three pistols and an NLAW.

The less-good bits:

• Steven's accent is intentionally gratingly unconvincing - not to mention whiny. I suppose it helps with portraying his "helplessness", but sweet Freya in Asgard, to Brit ears it's fingernails down an East End mockney blackboard. I mean, it's not quite as weirdly out of place as Jason Statham's*, but it's not necessarily attractive for a character lead.
• A few minor plothole moments and inconsistencies.

 

_{*FYI: Jason is from Derbyshire - via a fairly posh Norfolk grammar school not far from me. Jerry Springer's more Cockney than he is.
Nobody - but nobody - really talks like that unless they're taking the mick.}

 

All in all, a very solid and promising start to the series, and less confusing than you'd think.

BTW, while the violence is fairly tame in this first one, it's supposedly rated 16+ for a reason.

 

Or if you want a faster summary:

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Edited March 30, 2022 by ThaOGDreamWeaver

[Mr. Vee]

I found it painfully dull but hoping now that the preliminaries are sorted it'll pick up. 

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Ethan Hawke's villain is definitely the highlight.

 

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

I don't quite agree about the dull, but...

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A great villain is a rare and wonderful thing, and I really, really hope they let him go the whole way to E6 and don't bait-and-switch early.

 

One of the things that helps is that - while Feige's MCU has never been scared of a little reinvention or retconning, and neither have the books - they haven't picked a famous villain with any previous history or performances. (Arthur Harrow is barely in the books, and more of your workaday mad scientist).

 

That lets the writers - and Hawke, who worked in tandem - go out there and create something new and special.

Allegedly there's bits of David Koresh, Steve Jobs, Carl Jung, Jimmy Swaggart and a few other notorious demagogues in the blender. Hawke also ref'd Josef Mengele, so maybe there's a bit of mad science in there too, but again - that belief that what he's doing is right and that's why people have to die unpleasantly.

 

Also - may have said this about 888 times here and elsewhere, but it's worth saying again - MCU properties naturally focus on the hero, but fail the villain. Without a decent antagonist there's no way for your hero to grow. I would argue that Hawke could be Marvel's fifth proper villain out of all their MCU properties: the others being Michael Keaton, Tony Leung, Kathryn Hahn, and the Walternate'd Ian De Caestecker.

 

Edited March 30, 2022 by ThaOGDreamWeaver

[Frostbiter]

I enjoyed it. His English accent is really bad though. It made me cringe in the same way as hearing someone pronounce Appalachia as Appalashia.

[Zephyr Star]

  On 3/31/2022 at 2:09 AM, Frostbiter said:

I enjoyed it. His English accent is really bad though. It made me cringe in the same way as hearing someone pronounce Appalachia as Appalashia.

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I think it's the point. He's not English, instead it's just one of the personalities. The woman he called was confused as to why he was speaking like that. 

 I don't think this is spoilery but doing it anyway.

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I loved every minute of the show. I was not at all expecting it to be as funny as it was and I was impressed with Oscar Issacs' comedic timings. I loved that there was only one brief mention of someone else in the MCU but even then I think it was a mild easter egg. I have very little knowledge of Moon Knight, so I wasn't going in with any expectations. It had my attention from the first scene (nope, no thank you) to the end scene. I am really looking forward to the rest of the series.

 

Edited April 1, 2022 by Zephyr Star

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

Definitely looking forward to the rest of the series.

Especially as they've just dropped an intriguing character poster...

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[Frostbiter]

  On 4/1/2022 at 1:16 AM, Zephyr Star said:

 

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I think it's the point. He's not English, instead it's just one of the personalities. The woman he called was confused as to why he was speaking like that. 

 I don't think this is spoilery but doing it anyway.

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I loved every minute of the show. I was not at all expecting it to be as funny as it was and I was impressed with Oscar Issacs' comedic timings. I loved that there was only one brief mention of someone else in the MCU but even then I think it was a mild easter egg. I have very little knowledge of Moon Knight, so I wasn't going in with any expectations. It had my attention from the first scene (nope, no thank you) to the end scene. I am really looking forward to the rest of the series.

 

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I got that it was intentional to show that he didn't belong, that he was other. It's still grating. A person will pick up partial accents naturally by living in a place long enough. It felt too overdone.

Edited April 1, 2022 by Frostbiter

[Hyperstrike]

  On 1/18/2022 at 9:19 AM, ThaOGDreamWeaver said:

(yes, there's an entire city of 3.6m people who all sound like Ozzy.)

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SHAROOOON!!!

[Hyperstrike]

  On 1/18/2022 at 9:19 AM, ThaOGDreamWeaver said:

EDIT: incidentally, The Internet Being Undefeated and all that, someone's worked out where Steven's flat is.

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Hell, the Internet was able to chase down Shia Leboef's little white flag thing.

Simply finding a flat based on high quality video footage?

CAAAAAAKE!

[DougGraves]

I found it tedious and dull.  But I know Moon Knight, so to me this is just dragging out reveals of things I already know.

 

My wife knows nothing of Moon Knight and enjoyed it.  She liked trying to figure out what was going on.

 

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

I think it's kind of why they picked him. He's well-known to nerds but the average punter in the street's never seen him before. And is very much not what the MCU audience have come to expect in terms of tone, theming or depth.

 

I get the feeling they're not taking the big risky swings with their tentpole cinema audiences (Eternals aside - which did respectable business but didn't smash records.)

Feels like they're testing a whole bunch of things out and seeing what flies with a semi-captive audience.

 

Not just comments or socials either. I work in a slightly different field, but when you're delivering streaming VoD or AoD, there's a whole bunch of Big Data about what people watch, where people skip, where people rewind and look/listen to again, or replay whole episodes for things they loved and want to show other people, and what they share externally. It's slightly creepy in concept, but in practice nobody in their right mind is going to dig out how many serial killer shows/pods you're consuming, or worry about your playlist changing towards to dark revenge based mood music, Brad. Surrender yourself to the authorities now. Friend Computer sees all. 

Edited April 5, 2022 by ThaOGDreamWeaver
added bouncy bubble beverage

[DougGraves]

I am very impressed with Marvel's branching out with all kinds of characters.  

[biostem]

  On 4/5/2022 at 7:48 PM, DougGraves said:

I am very impressed with Marvel's branching out with all kinds of characters.  

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Honestly, I feel like they're throwing everything at the wall and seeing what sticks, at this point...

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

Well, yes, though being a bit of a luvvie, dahling, I'd say they're seeing what plays in Peoria. Not everything is gonna hit with every audience, even the captive D+ one.

 

But the way folks ate up Wandavision  was a surprise to everyone. I mean, c'mon - a surreal, slow-burn, Twilight Zone-ish experience that went WAY high-concept (Classic sitcom tributes? Multiverses? Swapping fights for heavy philosophy? Musical gags? Heavy tragedy? Ralph Boehner?) It's the kind of thing Yank ad execs would have cancelled at birth if they saw it on Autumn Sweeps, and even UK Channel 4 might have thought twice about.

 

But if that can fly, they've got options. Lots of them. Not just on which characters to pick from a cast of thousands, but on what kind of stories they can tell with them. Now they need to figure out how far they can push it and where.

Edited April 6, 2022 by ThaOGDreamWeaver

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

So, Episode 2:

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• Kind of a pity you never get the lockers with guns and money on Storage Wars.
• ACAB. Well, ACAECMR. (All Cops Are Evil Conspiracy Members Really)
• More excellent Hawke/Harrow creepiness. He's nice... until he's very, very much not.
• Leila seems annoyed. Also hard to pin down quite where her accent's supposed to be from: but some highly effective ass-kicking going on.
• Mr Knight still packs a punch - and a natty outfit. 
• We're kind of aware as to why Marc exists now and what his function is. But Steven... why is Steven? In the books (again, as a "clean" viewer you won't know this), he's a wealthy CEO whose work funds Marc's. This Steven doesn't seem to have a purpose - yet. But:
  • it's not just the money: MK uses different personalities to gain access to different people and places - it's possible that nerdy, academic Steven won't attract as much attention in the British Museum (or its Marvel analogue) as a diehard mercenary.
  • Also: if he 's more than one person  it might survive Ammit's nasty insta-Judgement Day spell.
  • Question remains: is Marc or Steven the "primary" - in this universe, at least?
• Ammit seems nice. Not. I have a feeling Arthur is being played.
• Khonshu also doesn't seem like a fun time to be around in the series, but he seems to be nicer in person.
• Definitely more into the swing and direction of the story now: we have a standard-issue Magic McGuffin which will points the way to the Ultimate Vault Of DOOM, or whatever. Bad guys win round 1: we might now see MK & Layla steal the Ark Shankar Stones Oscillation Overthruster Scarab Compass back for a bit until it's needed for a Final(ish) Confrontation, or find and hold a secondary Key Of Awesome+5 McGuffin instead. This is all fairly standard stuff, but that hasn't stopped me rewatching Raiders any time it comes on TV. It's not the years, it's the mileage.

 

One side note: as a Brit, I've just been utterly floored by something. I was today years old when I found out I'm not looking at London - it's all filmed in Budapest. Even down to the shop fronts, banks and an authentically grimy London bus. Huge plaudits for the production crew for pulling that off - then again, the bus being on time should have been a clue.

Edited April 6, 2022 by ThaOGDreamWeaver