The Official, Long Awaited, TV Shows Thread

[Deleted member 11852]

So Halo episode 1, well it's definitely interesting and personally I liked it but it's certainly going to be polarising for some Halo fans and some may be disappointed with some of the creative direction. This is going into a spoiler tag although I will not mention the story at all.

Spoiler

First thing, 117's voice is obviously different and for people who can easily adapt to actor changes in TV shows or movies, you'll be fine. But if you've played Halo for hundreds or thousands of hours and for you, Steve Downes is the voice of Master Chief, then the new guy is near going to feel right. The actor is clearly not even trying to mimic Steve Downes and this is just a creative decision they made.

The quality of the FX are very varied, with some looking quite a bit rough. I think this a challenge that almost all FX-heavy TV shows working with a new IP have for the first few episodes - at least TV shows without absurd budgets like Game of Thrones, The Witcher and The Expanse. The production teams are having to produce visuals and they're probably still experimenting with some things. Spartans's are massive (although not compared to Covenant Brutes) but also really agile and in some scenes they capture this really well and in others it looks off. I am sure they'll the mark more as the series progresses.

The visuals will appeal to some and not to others noting that the games veered all over the place on visual style, and they certainly don't shy away from violence and blood. I like this. It's a violent very universe.

But whilst watching it you can't help but feel that something is off and it took me a while to pinpoint it. It's not that things are bad, but the visuals - the design language and even the FX - are heavily inspired and recognisable from the games. but these are married to different actors and the complete absence of the epic Halo soundtrack. You get occasional snippets of familiar audio FX like the Chief's suit shield recharging but then a return to what feels like an almost alien soundscape accompanying very familiar visuals.

I feel like this may sound negative but I think Halo is a really tough nut to adapt to live action. And I did like it and I'm looking forward to future episodes.

 

[Malo]

Halo comes across like a more violent Power Rangers in its style. I guess it appeals to a young Halo fan crowd or something? Oooohh look it's a Spartan! Let's cheer or something.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

So Halo episode 1, well it's definitely interesting and personally I liked it but it's certainly going to be polarising for some Halo fans and some may be disappointed with some of the creative direction. This is going into a spoiler tag although I will not mention the story at all.

Spoiler

First thing, 117's voice is obviously different and for people who can easily adapt to actor changes in TV shows or movies, you'll be fine. But if you've played Halo for hundreds or thousands of hours and for you, Steve Downes is the voice of Master Chief, then the new guy is near going to feel right. The actor is clearly not even trying to mimic Steve Downes and this is just a creative decision they made.

The quality of the FX are very varied, with some looking quite a bit rough. I think this a challenge that almost all FX-heavy TV shows working with a new IP have for the first few episodes - at least TV shows without absurd budgets like Game of Thrones, The Witcher and The Expanse. The production teams are having to produce visuals and they're probably still experimenting with some things. Spartans's are massive (although not compared to Covenant Brutes) but also really agile and in some scenes they capture this really well and in others it looks off. I am sure they'll the mark more as the series progresses.

The visuals will appeal to some and not to others noting that the games veered all over the place on visual style, and they certainly don't shy away from violence and blood. I like this. It's a violent very universe.

But whilst watching it you can't help but feel that something is off and it took me a while to pinpoint it. It's not that things are bad, but the visuals - the design language and even the FX - are heavily inspired and recognisable from the games. but these are married to different actors and the complete absence of the epic Halo soundtrack. You get occasional snippets of familiar audio FX like the Chief's suit shield recharging but then a return to what feels like an almost alien soundscape accompanying very familiar visuals.

I feel like this may sound negative but I think Halo is a really tough nut to adapt to live action. And I did like it and I'm looking forward to future episodes.

Well, I was going to wait but that prompted me to take a look at the first episode ... and ... I'm struggling not to dislike it intensely.

Without going into spoilers or too many details (I could write multiple paragraphs about why I have such a negative reaction to it), I'll just say that I don't like that they are basically rewriting Halo history when there is such a rich and fertile ground of material they could have used or drawn inspiration from.

In general, 117's voice is the least of the things I dislike. Miranda Keyes is a wimp compared to her Halo Universe persona, but her father Commander Keyes seems to be well cast, at least so far. I dislike the actress they chose for Dr. Halsey although I can't quite pin my finger on why. Perhaps because she's too young for the role? Perhaps it's because it feels like they chose a pretty woman for her character because they felt like the show needed a pretty lead? Her portrayal of Dr. Halsey isn't terribly convincing.

That's about all I can say without going into potential spoilers which I don't want to spend the next hour ranting about like some madman.

Needless to say, I feel the show would have been better served by having someone other than Master Chief in the role because this show's Master Chief acts nothing like how the Master Chief would actually behave.

Despite all that, I'm still interested to see where they go with this even if I have to fight to hold off my distaste for how they are treating the franchise. Will I end up finding some redeeming feature in the show or will it just further make me regret Microsoft giving Paramount license to make a show about Halo?

I look at something like The Witcher series and see how they treated that with a fair bit of respect and drew directly from the lore of the show with some minor alterations in order to fit a TV series script. It feels like The Witcher.

OTOH - Halo thus far feels like they went and threw away most of the established Halo lore, said, "Fuck that shit." and are just writing whatever they hell they feel like writing with just passing references to characters and locations within the Halo Universe. AAAAAUUUUUGGGGGGHHHHHHHH. This looks like Halo, but doesn't feel like Halo.

Regards,
SB

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Without going into spoilers or too many details (I could write multiple paragraphs about why I have such a negative reaction to it), I'll just say that I don't like that they are basically rewriting Halo history when there is such a rich and fertile ground of material they could have used or drawn inspiration from.

Yes, this is entirely what they've done and that was very much their intention. The show is based on the premise of the universe - the UNSC, the politics of Earth, the Spartan programme, the Covenant, and obviously Halo rings but aside from the logical relations of those things in the universe, it's a totally different take. That's why I said I can see this would be polarising and some would be disappointed with the creative direction.

In an interview with Variety, show runner Steven Kane said they didn't even look at the game.

 

[Mariner]

Yes, this is entirely what they've done and that was very much their intention. The show is based on the premise of the universe - the UNSC, the politics of Earth, the Spartan programme, the Covenant, and obviously Halo rings but aside from the logical relations of those things in the universe, it's a totally different take. That's why I said I can see this would be polarising and some would be disappointed with the creative direction.

In an interview with Variety, show runner Steven Kane said they didn't even look at the game.

Sounds like what happened with the most recent Star Wars trilogy. Decades of universe-building from a series of (mostly decent) authors and they just chucked it out of the window and made a lot of shit up. In fact, the same could be said for Lucas' prequels which contradicted everything which happened in the later books as well.

I wonder what it is about the 'creative' types that makes them decide to make up some second-rate crap instead of using what has already been written for them?

 

[Bludd]

Sounds like what happened with the most recent Star Wars trilogy. Decades of universe-building from a series of (mostly decent) authors and they just chucked it out of the window and made a lot of shit up. In fact, the same could be said for Lucas' prequels which contradicted everything which happened in the later books as well.

I wonder what it is about the 'creative' types that makes them decide to make up some second-rate crap instead of using what has already been written for them?

disney doesnt want to pay more royalties

 

[WhiningKhan]

It's not the royalties. Foundation was intentionally ruined without using 1% of source material.

Assholes exist for producing shit - the end product does not differ significantly whether the source material is gourmet or junk food.

 

[Mariner]

I've only half-watched a couple of seasons of The Expanse (I'm currently reading the penultimate book) and it was a pleasant surprise to see the plot in the TV show match the books so closely.

I shudder to think what we might see with the new Middle Earth based TV show from Amazon. I wasn't overly-impressed with Jackson's LoTR movies and The Hobbit trilogy was terrible and I expect more of the latter than the former in the new show. I'll not be getting my knickers in a twist about any of the actors being black, however!

 

[iroboto]

Sounds like what happened with the most recent Star Wars trilogy. Decades of universe-building from a series of (mostly decent) authors and they just chucked it out of the window and made a lot of shit up. In fact, the same could be said for Lucas' prequels which contradicted everything which happened in the later books as well.

I wonder what it is about the 'creative' types that makes them decide to make up some second-rate crap instead of using what has already been written for them?

It’s a show. MC is a silent protagonist. People watch TV and read books to relate to the characters, otherwise if they are just interested in plot only you get TENET. Or at best you get a documentary you enjoy.
They had to rewrite the story because games and shows are different mediums. You need characters with flaws to grow from and you need a hook at the beginning of the series or people won’t watch.

the best hook may have been glassing reach; but MC won’t ever be introduce until significantly later. Nor would it explain a lot of backstory to the spartan program.

shows have to appeal more than just the core Halo audience, who barely support the games btw, and so you need context, you need multiple plot lines, characters, a hook, etc.

Following the events of what happens on Halo the game would result is mass exodus after the first episode.

It’s telling that game sites reviewed the show poorly but many non game sites reviewed Halo positively. One group is looking for a conversion of a game to a show which would never work and have limited audiences the other is looking for a story.

imagine if arcane followed what happens in a LOL game, boring as shit. Arcane was great because it had virtually no tie in with the game except some characters and lore. That’s more or less what needs to be done with Halo.

In a day of age where a great deal of many experimental shows are cancelled after the first season, Halo needs to rely significantly more than their core audience to keep it going.

My real criticism for the show is that they've done way too much telling, and very little showing. And that's probably why some people are feeling 'meh'. If that makes any sense. There was a lot being told and not being shown. So if you're not paying attention, then a lot of stuff will go woosh.

Spoiler

a) Halsey is Keye's mother
b) the cortana program
c) MC you killed my mother
d) the universe sees you plastered everywhere
e) insurrectionist war that's only talked about but never shown
f) the human with Mercy
g) the forerunner artifact that links MC to being a descendant of forerunners

 

[Bludd]

i never was a halo fan so im happy to skip halo tv series

 

[Mariner]

I've never played one second of a Halo game so not exactly a massive fan. I read 2 of the books, I think it was, many, many moons ago now. First one not too bad. Second one drivel, I seem to recall.

From what I've heard, it sounds as though the Halo universe as developed in the games is a good one so I'll probably give the show a try. I'm unlikely to be upset about any changes from the games, providing it is half-decent.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

It’s a show. MC is a silent protagonist. People watch TV and read books to relate to the characters, otherwise if they are just interested in plot only you get TENET. Or at best you get a documentary you enjoy.
They had to rewrite the story because games and shows are different mediums. You need characters with flaws to grow from and you need a hook at the beginning of the series or people won’t watch.

But they actually didn't. The games aren't the only source material into the Halo Universe, there are plenty of books (both traditional novels as well as graphic novels and comics) that go into much more detail about the lore, the politics, Master Chief, Dr. Halsey, etc. that they could have drawn from.

There is so much existing material that could have made for multiple interesting Halo based movies and TV shows that're better than the dreck that was shown in the first episode without ever touching what was presented in any of the games.

Now, it's possible that the show has gotten off on the wrong foot which is why I'm attempting to rein in my distaste for what they've done. However, there's a lot of work that needs to be done if the "writers" (and I'm currently using that word very loosely here) want to change my opinion of the show.

It makes me so angry everytime I think about what they did to Miranda Keyes. In the Halo Universe she's a very strong female character. In the show, she comes across as a wimpering weak willed female with no backbone. It was very disappointing to see that. I'm guessing it was done as some sort of very blunt and heavy handed attempt to show unimaginative character growth as the show goes on (at least I hope so), but there are better ways to do that without turning the character into some weak individual. For example, perhaps a strong willed Miranda Keyes (in this Halo universe) held some questionable moral views due to UNSC propaganda and as the show goes on she has a shift in her moral compass. AAAUUUUGGGGGHHHHHH. She was one of my favorite characters within the Halo Universe.

Regards,
SB

 

[iroboto]

But they actually didn't. The games aren't the only source material into the Halo Universe, there are plenty of books (both traditional novels as well as graphic novels and comics) that go into much more detail about the lore, the politics, Master Chief, Dr. Halsey, etc. that they could have drawn from.

There is so much existing material that could have made for multiple interesting Halo based movies and TV shows that're better than the dreck that was shown in the first episode without ever touching what was presented in any of the games.

Now, it's possible that the show has gotten off on the wrong foot which is why I'm attempting to rein in my distaste for what they've done. However, there's a lot of work that needs to be done if the "writers" (and I'm currently using that word very loosely here) want to change my opinion of the show.

It makes me so angry everytime I think about what they did to Miranda Keyes. In the Halo Universe she's a very strong female character. In the show, she comes across as a wimpering weak willed female with no backbone. It was very disappointing to see that. I'm guessing it was done as some sort of very blunt and heavy handed attempt to show unimaginative character growth as the show goes on (at least I hope so), but there are better ways to do that without turning the character into some weak individual. For example, perhaps a strong willed Miranda Keyes (in this Halo universe) held some questionable moral views due to UNSC propaganda and as the show goes on she has a shift in her moral compass. AAAUUUUGGGGGHHHHHH. She was one of my favorite characters within the Halo Universe.

Regards,
SB

Right me too. But the audience doesn’t really know UNSC is bad. The main audience is really figuring that out in the first episode they are bad. Keyes being used as a sound board here.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Right me too. But the audience doesn’t really know UNSC is bad. The main audience is really figuring that out in the first episode they are bad. Keyes being used as a sound board here.

Speaking of which, it's cartoonishly bad how that was handled. This is a TV series, not a Movie. There's plenty of time for discovery. Rather than just a very ineptly done heavy handed illustration of the "bad old" UNSC, it would have been something that we, as the audience, discovered along the way as characters within the show also discovered them.

And don't even get me going on the illogical mental gymnastics that the writers went through to come up with the absurd reaction of the girl from the village when Keyes talked to her. Actually, I take that back, that's giving the writers too much credit, they didn't think and just wrote whatever the F. just because social commentary. That also could have been done better while getting the same point across. AAAAAUUUUUGGGGGGHHHHHHH. As one reviewer on IMDB commented (paraphrased), hey that's fantastic that there's an Asian female lead, now why did they have to make her into a blithering idiot?

Sorry, none of this is aimed at you. But it's just poking and prodding at all the myriad of things that are just either ineptly done in the show or are just bad. Beyond the fact that I may not agree with throwing out 99% of the established Halo universe, I probably wouldn't be reacting so badly to it if the writers were actually halfway competent at crafting a logical story with good pacing.

Again, it's a friggin' TV series, there's no needed for unimaginative overly blunt heavy handed instruments of storytelling, illogical characters, heavily stereotyped characters and rushed reveals.

At this point, I wish Netflix or even Amazon had been given the rights to make this series rather than Paramount.

Regards,
SB

 

[Deleted member 11852]

They had to rewrite the story because games and shows are different mediums. You need characters with flaws to grow from and you need a hook at the beginning of the series or people won’t watch.

They could have written a quality six-to-ten episode screenplay based on the original story. If you approach that like the first season of Game of Thrones or Battlestar Galactica, you could have had the entire first episode just covering the events of the Pillar of Autumn arriving near the Halo ring, then the Covenent ships arriving, this gives you time for some exposition as they approach and engage in ship-to-ship combat with the Autumn, you get to know Captain Keyes really well and other characters who the Chief would regroup with in later epodes - making Keyes loss more dramatic. They can show the technologies differences between humans and Covenant based on the arrival of the multiple CCS-class Covenant battlegroups chasing the Autumn and the incursions by Covenant of the Autumn, how even marines are hopefully outmatches by Brutes. They could have done a whole episode setting this up, before cracking the Chief of Cryo right at the end.. cliffhanger ending as the Covenant break into the cryo hangar.

Episode 2 could have been Chief fighting to get to the Bridge, meeting with Keyes, acquiring Cortana, fighting off the Covent then the eventual evacuation from the ship, wit the cliffhanger ending being the Autumn plummeting towards the Halo ring piloted by Keyes. Then it's easy to write a bunch of interesting episodes following the Chief investigating the Halo ring, fighting Covenant, rescuing marines and allowing time for more exposition and speculation about the Halo ring. A whole episodes could easily be focussed the Chief and marines finding the location of Keyes, boarding and infiltrating the Covenant ship holding Keyes and the attempted rescue etc.

The original trilogy has such a great story.

 

[iroboto]

They could have written a quality six-to-ten episode screenplay based on the original story. If you approach that like the first season of Game of Thrones or Battlestar Galactica, you could have had the entire first episode just covering the events of the Pillar of Autumn arriving near the Halo ring, then the Covenent ships arriving, this gives you time for some exposition as they approach and engage in ship-to-ship combat with the Autumn, you get to know Captain Keyes really well and other characters who the Chief would regroup with in later epodes - making Keyes loss more dramatic. They can show the technologies differences between humans and Covenant based on the arrival of the multiple CCS-class Covenant battlegroups chasing the Autumn and the incursions by Covenant of the Autumn, how even marines are hopefully outmatches by Brutes. They could have done a whole episode setting this up, before cracking the Chief of Cryo right at the end.. cliffhanger ending as the Covenant break into the cryo hangar.

Episode 2 could have been Chief fighting to get to the Bridge, meeting with Keyes, acquiring Cortana, fighting off the Covent then the eventual evacuation from the ship, wit the cliffhanger ending being the Autumn plummeting towards the Halo ring piloted by Keyes. Then it's easy to write a bunch of interesting episodes following the Chief investigating the Halo ring, fighting Covenant, rescuing marines and allowing time for more exposition and speculation about the Halo ring. A whole episodes could easily be focussed the Chief and marines finding the location of Keyes, boarding and infiltrating the Covenant ship holding Keyes and the attempted rescue etc.

The original trilogy has such a great story.

I think that will still happen in some format.

Essentially what should have been the prologue is the insurrectionist war and the glassing of Reach. Noble team retrieving cortana before launching off on Pillar of Autumn.
The pilot episodes of Battlestar Galatica are lightyears ahead of most shows. Which I wish looking back at Halo, could have been able to pull off, but for some reason they couldn't, perhaps too many episodes to introduce Chief who they wanted as the main protagonist of the show.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

I think that will still happen in some format.

You u-turned real quick from "they can't use the original story" to re-writing my screenplay!

 

[iroboto]

You u-turned real quick from "they can't use the original story" to re-writing my screenplay!

haha.
Well there are challenges because the prologue would largely bypass Master Chief lol. and they are only green lit for 1 season? Budgeting limits how much they can do as well. I do agree with your sentiment, but there were likely restrictions that stopped that from happening.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Well there are challenges because the prologue would largely bypass Master Chief lol. and they are only green lit for 1 season?

They announced they had started filming season 2 even before episode 1 aired so that was probably agreed up front.

 

[iroboto]

They announced they had started filming season 2 even before episode 1 aired so that was probably agreed up front.

thanks for the heads up.
Indeed, that is a head scratcher.