Marvel TV News

Jon Schnepp implied Moon Knight will appear in The Punisher--if so it would confirm my speculation he would be the rumoured hero appearing (he certainly makes sense in context). I'd guess this will be in the form of a cameo rather than an involved appearance (otherwise there would be marketing attached to it, ala the Punisher in Daredevil season two).

Speaking of predictions, we got confirmation that Vincent D'Onofrio, aka, Wilson Fisk (the Kingpin) will be joining Daredevil season three. New showrunner Erik Oleson (The Man in the High Castle etc) officially announced the decision which makes sense both in terms of fan service and for whatever version of the "Born Again" storyline we're going to get. The other thing this tells us is that Fisk won't appear in The Punisher (something I hadn't seen speculated, but within the realm of possibility given their interactions in Daredevil season two). My hope is that Fisk is the villain The Defenders have to face next--someone grounded and whose background is already understood by fans.

Filming, as far as we know, has not started (refuting MCU Exchange's rumour from a month ago), but presumably will commence soon. Along with this announcement it's also been confirmed that the show will air in 2018.

We know Finn Jones started martial arts training almost a month ago and now his co-star Jessica Henwick is back at it, suggesting the ramp up to Iron Fist season two is underway (my prediction was that filming would start in January, link above, but it could be even sooner).

Runaways filming recently wrapped (the pilot was filmed from February 10-March 3, with the rest of the show begun in June). The four months of filming is a similar timeframe for Netflix shows given that there's just 10 episodes (less the pilot, which presumably consists of the first two episodes). It's official trailer was unfortunately mostly a rehash of the earlier teaser and seemed to get no traction on social media. Hulu needs to work on its marketing (whatever you think of Inhumans there was no escaping the marketing).

An untitled ABC Marvel show has been announced with this premise:

The series will focus on the Sharif family, an ordinary Middle Eastern-American family with two superhero parents at a time when it’s illegal to be a superhero, so they are forced to save the world in secret.

Seemingly these are characters created for the show with a premise that's not far off the Fox default of "Mutant Menace." I worry that without an established character to market this has little hope in succeeding. When I first saw the headline I thought it might connect to a Ms Marvel show, but this clearly isn't that.

IMAX finally commented on their interpretation of what happened with the Inhumans and it's an interesting opinion (link below). They feel the problem was largely audience expectations:

Customers expected a production akin to a mega-budget blockbuster movie, rather than pilots for a television show. Moreover, the fact that this was Marvel IP set the bar at a level you wouldn’t see from other pieces of content or IP because of the reputation and the high production value of Marvel movies.

There's some truth to that I feel--the critical drubbing the movie-version received was far above what was warranted. IMAX's plan is to continue with the concept, but a away from Marvel to avoid those kinds of expectations (IMAX lost 11.1 million on the deal--how far off that was against their expectations is uncertain, as we know they expected to lose money).

Speaking of the Inhumans, the show slipped into terrible ratings territory for episode five, dropping below Agents of SHIELD's average (1.98, with an 0.4 in the key demographic--this is similar to "Wake Up", the least watched episode from AoS last year). The football game clearly hurt, as ratings improved somewhat for episode six (2.13 and 0.5). Comparatively, The Gifted dropped slightly, going from 3.5 to 3.36 (4%), the key demographic slipping from 1.1 to 1.0. This suggests the Fox show has hit its audience making it reasonably successful (it's DVR+ numbers remained steady at 64%).

I mentioned last time that lazy "superhero fatigue" arguments were re-circulating given the lower ratings for shows this fall. Armin is also peddling this crap, but it will be interesting to see if this floats up further into popular entertainment coverage. On its face the idea is ridiculous (as I've discussed before--pretty hard to justify the idea when the movie industry is being floated by comic book popularity). Ratings are falling due to poor writing, directing, etc, with networks pumping out generic crap trying to cash-in. I think the Netflix shows have pushed audience expectations in terms of quality, so mediocre fair isn't going to cut it. Whether this is a continuing trend or just a blip of the season remains to be seen.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

Marvel TV News

At long last The Punisher release date dropped, November 17th, the revised date due to the mass shooting in Las Vegas on October 1st. While it has never been officially confirmed, Newsday's (Vernon Gay) rumour of a date change is the ultimate source for the flood of stories after the show pulled out of NYCC, with most believing MCU Exchange's scoop date of October 13th was the original plan. Of interest is that the speculated date of November 10th was never in the cards (since the move could easily have been to that spot), but it's not far off summer speculation of November 14th. Interestingly, this puts the show head-to-head against Justice League, albeit other than both being based on comic books they aren't truly in direct competition. Oddly enough, looking at Netflix's schedule you'd think the 10th would be a better date--Stranger Things drops October 27th, Alias Grace November 3rd, and then nothing until Godless November 22nd (which seems similar enough to The Punisher that I think it will suffer from the proximity).

We learned a couple of weeks ago that Finn Jones would appear in Luke Cage season two, but at the time it was unknown if it was simply a cameo or something more. Mike Colter has revealed it will be more extensive than a cameo, saying:

We are teamed up for a bit. That’s the whole point of bringing that flavor to it. I can see how this works. That’s what good about it. We’re giving people what they want. ... let’s give a little Heroes for Hire somewhere in the season and see what happens

This sounds like an actual story arc--whether for a few episodes or more is hard to say (probably not more than half a season). It'll be interesting to see how Cheo Hodari Coker will write Danny Rand (he's been pretty faithful to source material, so I'd expect a more comic book accurate version), as this will be the first time Scott Buck doesn't have any impute on it. I doubt Danny will get his costume however, as that's likely going to be reserved for Iron Fist season two.

Colter couldn't say when the second season will air, but hoped for the first quarter or first half of next year (which would fit my prediction).

The site that posted the story added the following:

Though Jones’ portrayal of Danny Rand was one of the most criticized aspects of The Defenders, and his own series is the most critically-panned of all Netflix series, it was still a hit among viewers.

I'm not sure the former is true, but the latter has to be hard for sites to admit after months of crapping all over Iron Fist.

It's been reported that viewership for The Defenders was the lowest among the Netflix series'. Interestingly enough, despite that the show is the the most binge-watched of those shows (and the third highest ever). Putting aside what you think of the quality of the team-up, one of the lessons learned here is that eight-episodes is simply too easy--too disposable--and Netflix would be better off making it a longer series (something that would allow for development missing from the first installment).

I've been interested in keeping tabs on the ratings for both the Inhumans and The Gifted (I posted my review of the former's episode three--which Midnight's Edge thought was an improvement, while I think it's the weakest; my episode four review is here). The Fox show's troubles carry over from the premiere (which I discuss here)--the dry as dust mutant-menace stuff along with the poorly developed characters and soap opera-like elements (eg the lazy pregnancy plot)--it still gets good performances from Stephen Moyer (Reed Strucker) and Emma Dumont (Polaris). Ratings (also here and here) make for an interesting comparison:
Inhumans: 3.8 - 2.8 - 2.3 (0.9 - 0.7 - 0.6 key demographic) 39% drop since the premiere (33%)
The Gifted: 4.8 - 3.8 - 3.5 (1.5 -1.2 - 1.1 key demographic) 27% drop since the premiere (26%)

It's worth noting the Inhumans drop was much less between episodes 3 and 4 (17%), but more than The Gifted's drop between two and three (7%). Friday nights (when the latter airs) is well-known to have far less viewership than other nights (30% is the figure I've seen), but factoring that in The Gifted is still ahead (Inhumans latest episode would be at 3.0 with that bump). The DVR numbers are important and show both shows with significant increases (a similar edge is there, 74% vs 61%). Thus far the Fox effort has stopped the freefall, possibly due positive critical buzz. It's worth noting Inhumans is still ahead of an average Agents of SHIELD episode from last season.

This kind of thing--low ratings for superhero shows this fall--has led to some speculation (whether it's serious or clickbait is up to you) that the superhero TV bubble has burst. This is overreaching by far and is due more to the mediocre offerings of the fall. The real test is when The Punisher, Runaways, and the heavy hitters from the CW drop.

I was not impressed by The New Mutants trailer. As a fan of the early run of the comic seeing what looks like a generic horror film was disappointing (an opinion shared by others). That said, it could just be an attempt to cash in on the audience for It, but if so, it doesn't really sell the movie to comic book fans. You could watch the trailer and have no idea it's about people with superpowers. The media is creating a false dichotomy wherein people who disliked the trailer are unwilling to accept anything other than a generic comic book movie (whatever that is). My issue, and I suspect the issue many others had, is that there's nothing distinctive about the trailer--nothing that separates it from any other horror film. This doesn't mean I've lost my interest in the movie, just that I think the trailer does a poor job selling it.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

Inhumans Episode Four Review

I thought the previous episode (episode three) was the worst of the series thus far, but four is a step in the right direction. It has issues, but there were elements that approached the better parts of the pilot. Written by Wendy West and directed by David Straiton, it has some well-written dialogue. I mentioned in my last review that part of the problem with the series is uneven storylines, and unfortunately Karnack's and Gorgon's remain virtually unwatchable. Crystal's suffers without Maximus' presence and Auran's drags without any strong sense of menace (Mortis comes across as a goofball rather than scary), so the show is left with the stronger footings of Maximus, Black Bolt, and Medusa. Louise's story, which I wasn't a fan of prior to this episode, improved immensely once she was attached to Medusa. In terms of plot the show is far too reliant on coincidence (each member of the royal family meets a human or humans who are both helpful to their immediate needs and serves to show them that humans aren't so bad). It also has a major conceptual flaw wherein we're told (and shown) that Attilan is a secret...and then every member of the royal family immediately tells anyone they meet who they are and where they are from. While I can come up with a reason for this (see below) the show itself should be providing one.

The ratings continued to fall (I still haven't seen PVR numbers), albeit 2.3 is higher than an average season four epsiode of Agents of SHIELD. They fell less than the gap between the pilot and episode three (26% for the latter, 17% now). In terms of the key demographic the gap was also smaller (22% vs 14%).

SPOILERS

We get a vague MCU reference from Maximus (simply referring to other superpowered individuals who are not Inhumans).

What Worked

• Medusa, despite being over the top with her aggression towards Louise early on, has the best plotline and character work in the episode (it crashes into Black Bolt's towards the end as those two are reunited)
• Black Bolt still works--bit of an average episode for him, but he's functional and we get away from his banal prison buddy (Sammy)
• Louise, I'd complained about the actress previously, but here she's fine and her interactions with Medusa are (by and large) quite good (suggesting the problem previous were director-related issues rather than the actress)
• Dr. Evan Declan, once he gets to his facility, is well played and the tie-in with Maximus further emphasized that his coup (and plans to empower himself) were long-planned
• Maximus' desire to empower himself belies his stated intent to create an egalitarian Inhuman society--this is an interesting turn and I'm curious what the show will do with it
• Auran/Mortis, while this isn't the greatest of storylines, at least the show has a reason for Mortis to not just immediately fry Black Bolt (Maximus wants genetic sampling from his brother before he dies); Auran's motivation still needs work and the actress could find another expression (it's been perma-frown since the pilot)

What Didn't

• Why set up the premise of how important it is for Attilan to stay hidden (one of the central conflicts with Maximus) when the royal family can't shut up about it as soon as they get to earth? Maybe the idea is they feel it will be revealed given Maximus' plan anyway, but if that's so it should have been stated
• Crystal's storyline--she remains privileged and annoying (as intended, but it's a bit much); the coincidence of running into a guy who knows a vet is trying (yet another convenient coincidence--a lot of these seem written in to save time)
• The genetic council, why on earth would they say no to Maximus? They had to know he'd kill them (and why deny him anyway--what did they benefit from doing that?)
• Gorgon's plotline still doesn't work, but at least he explains why Lockjaw didn't teleport the royal family all together
• Karnack's plot is the lowlight of the episode--a romance out of nowhere (is she attracted to his concussion? what's the appeal?) and he continues to not be himself

The sooner the show gets rid of the latter two plotlines the better--right now if you were to re-cut the episodes and have both simply off-camera the show would vastly improve. I think the idea is to both humble the royal family and to show them that humans aren't so bad, but that didn't necessitate making the royals elitist assholes or automatically falling in with helpful humans wherever they went. There's a lack of sophistication that makes the plot read like a first draft. Were it not for the positive performances the show would be a much bigger mess.

I think the show is on an upward trend as it starts to collapse plotlines together and that hopefully we'll get a good conclusion to the eight-episode arc. I still think it's marginally better than The Gifted (the Fox show has better cinematography and a more streamlined plot, but it's about as by-the-numbers as it could be with virtually no character depth). Regardless, I'll be glad when The Punisher drops.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

Inhumans Episode Three Review

As someone who enjoyed the pilot, episode three was a step down in quality. Written by Rich Cleveland and directed by Chris Fisher, the problems of the show were accented and I hope episode four can course correct. Three episodes in I now know what element of Game of Thrones, beyond family drama, that Scott Buck was trying to imitate: multiple storylines. There are no less than 7 storylines that are ongoing (Black Bolt, Medusa, Gorgon, Karnack, Maximus (including Crystal, but she may be breaking off on her own), Auran, and Louise (which seems to have merged with Medusa's). This is an enormous amount to handle in 40 minute chunks and I think creatively they bit off more than they could chew. This episode also suffers from missing development--necessary investment by the audience into plot and character. It's frustrating because there are good elements within the show, including this episode, but so much of it seems rushed (it's reminiscent of Batman v Superman where WB was so eager to get to Justice League that they were rushing through the narrative--I'm not sure what we're rushing to in this case, admittedly).

Official ratings for the episode still aren't out (early numbers can be found here), but it did fall (still above a typical Agents of SHIELD season four episode). It will be interesting to see how the ratings pan out--the quality of the next couple of episodes is going to make a big difference.

SPOILERS

We get two oblique MCU references in this episode, both in the same scene: one to Spider-Man and another to the Thing; both are in passing, but it's welcome given how parsimonious the Netflix shows are with them.

What Worked

• Black Bolt's storyline (the police and prison guards are pretty hastily put together, but I still think it hangs together)
• Medusa's storyline (other than her ridiculous attempt to talk an ATM into giving her money)
• Maximus' storyline (I'm not sure at this stage we really needed the flashback where he's removed from the line of succession, but if anyone needed extra motivation for him, there it is)
• Anson Mount, Serinda Swan, and Iwan Rheon are the only actors who have successfully given their characters emotional weight and that continues here
• Gorgon/Auran fight--it isn't perfect by any means, but for the most part I thought it worked
• Lockjaw
• Mortis (he's very underdeveloped and a little goofy, but I found him oddly endearing--his look reminds me of Isaac from The Orville)

What Didn't

• The hatred for Inhumans--it reminds me of The Gifted where neither creative team thought any explanation was necessary for this conflict (in Buck's case, maybe he thought his audience were familiar enough with Agents of SHIELD to not need one?); I find it constantly irritating, since just one or two quick scenes could have established it
• The Inhumans cast system--no one in the show has made an argument for why the status quo (eg the royal family) is a good thing; Maximus, despite being willing to kill to get what he wants, actually has a point in the conflict and there's been no effort to create a counterpoint (the show seems to assume that because Maximus is willing to do anything to succeed that provides the counterbalance, but that doesn't work)
• A lack of set-up and development--this plagued this episode--I feel like each episode needed another 10 minutes or so to flesh out secondary characters and plots--a lot of the issues below go away with that development (there was a noticeable improvement in that respect when you compare the pilot to the theatrical release because of the extra run time)
• Flashbacks (child actors! But even Black Bolt's parent's and the genetic council guy are pretty wooden)
• Karnack's storyline (taking away his ability removes the only thing that's interesting about him; the weird drug plantation people are just as random as Gorgon's friends--there's no investment in them; Karnack babbling about his family is also silly (I guess we blame the concussion, although it's exactly what Gorgon did in episode two); on the plus side, at least he realises he's concussed and we get a tiny piece of his backstory); Ken Leung has had some good moments, so I think the material here is holding him back
• Gorgon's storyline (has the same support problem as above, albeit arriving at the conflict helped--I still have no idea why the beach guys side with Gorgon, but it's pretty fortunate they want to die for him...just because--the reason offered is pretty goofy)
• Auran's storyline (we're not told enough about Mortis or anything about her other assistants, while her motives in helping Maximus remain underdeveloped; her acting is also pretty stilted)
• Louise's storyline (thankfully at an end as Medusa takes her hostage; the acting was a bit better than the pilot; we don't know enough about the character to get invested)
• Crystal (the acting is still weak, although there were glimmers of improvement)

Part of the basic framework of where we're going is pretty clear at this point. Each of the members of the royal family on earth are meeting a human (or humans) who are going to, well, humanize their view of humanity. They'll all come together and face off against...I'm not sure what, as I'm not convinced Maximus is the final villain. I'm not sure where the plot with the benefactor who rescues Black Bolt is going--is it a double cross, or is it something else? It's hard to say, although I think the show's end game is still to get the characters permanently to earth.

While I thought this was a weak episode, I'm still hopeful that as the plot tightens things will improve. Whatever you think of the show there are quality actors here and it would be a shame for Marvel to lose them just because this season is flawed. For fans of the show there is some hope out there: despite all the negativity in the press some are moving beyond the rhetoric and in terms of buzz it's still a bigger deal than the critically approved The Gifted (it's only real TV competition at this stage, as the Inhumans series will be over by the time The Punisher and The Runaways debut).

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

Marvel TV News

While Netflix continues to torture us by holding back the release date for The Punisher (likely delayed even longer now that its NYCC appearance has been cancelled), we do know a little more about the show, as some of the directors are now listed:

• Andy Goddard (among his extensive TV credits are solitary episodes for Iron Fist, Luke Cage, and Daredevil season two)
• Marc Jobst (a lengthy TV career, he directed solitary episodes of Luke Cage and Daredevil season two)
• Kari Skogland (extensive TV experience, but this is her first venture into Marvel Netflix)
• Stephen Surjik (has directed at least one episode of every Marvel Netflix show--a streak that will end with Jessica Jones season two)
• Jeremy Webb (the same sort of background as Skogland above)

Despite all the negative press there was still anticipation for ABC's Inhumans (at least, judging by this chart via Rotten Tomatoes). How did that register in the ratings? Variety noted it beat its 8pm competition in the coveted 18-49 demographic, while just losing out in the 9pm slot. Bleeding Cool noted it's numbers were superior to both Agents of SHIELD's normal numbers and its season four finale. Given the critical drubbing this is a solid opening--episode three will provide insight into how fans reacted to the TV pilot, albeit it's future is up in the air and likely controlled by Disney. One of the funny results of all the negative buzz is that there is buzz (unlike The Gifted, see below), so that people are curious about it even if they perceive it as a train wreck.

Speaking of the show, I posted a review looking at the differences between the movie and TV versions.

I've been thinking about the release dates for the Marvel Netflix shows. Prior to 2017 there had never been more than two shows released in a year. The current overlapping filming schedules suggest we'll be getting seasons much more rapidly, albeit we don't know just how quickly since Netflix drags its heels with Marvel release announcements. The best way to illustrate this is to look at what's happened in the past along with what we know about the future:

Completed
Daredevil (1): filming July-December (5 months), released in April, 2015 (4 months later)
Jessica Jones (1): filming February-August (6 months), released in November, 2015 (3 months)
Daredevil (2): filming July-December (5 months), released in March, 2016 (3 months)
Luke Cage (1): filming September-March (6 months), released in September, 2016 (6 months)
Iron Fist (1): filming April-October (6 months), released in March, 2017 (5 months)
The Defenders (1): filming October-March (5 months), released in August, 2017 (5 months)

Upcoming
The Punisher (1): filming October-April (6 months), released Oct/Nov, 2017 (6/7 months)
Jessica Jones (2): filming April-September (5 months)
Luke Cage (2): filming June-December (6 months)
Daredevil (3): filming October*-c.March
Iron Fist (2): filming January*-c.May
*unconfirmed

The gap between the end of filming and release seems to be growing longer (5-6 months of late), but I think that's less a trend and more to do with specific circumstance.  With this in mind we can speculate on release dates. So far the shortest gap between releases has been four months (between JJ and DD2), which will be beat by Punisher at 2 or 3 (I'll look at 3 or 4 month rotations and see how they fit):
JJ2 - January/February - January seems most likely to me, with February having Black Panther as its focus
LC2 - April-June - April; seems prudent to avoid Infinity War (May), albeit the four-month schedule would put it in May if my JJ prediction is correct
DD3 - July-October - July (makes the most sense on the 3-month rotation); this becomes September on the 4-month schedule if my JJ prediction is correct

IF2 - October-February - October; in the 4-month version this is January, both of which are empty of comparable competition

To summarize: for a three-month rotation I see JJ in January, LC in April, DD in July, and IF in October; on a four-month rotation it's January, May, September, and January.

Interesting news for Luke Cage season two has come out, as Entertainment Weekly has confirmed that Danny Rand will be appearing in the show. This makes a lot of sense, given that we know Misty Knight is joining Iron Fist season two, and further boosts the Heroes for Hire bond teased in The Defenders. I'd guess the appearance will be in the nature of a cameo (based on the fact that Finn Jones has been on the convention circuit while LC2 has been filming the last three plus months--and is just starting his Kung Fu training only recently (see below). It is possible, incidentally, that his scenes were shot at the beginning of the LC2 shoot before The Defenders dropped (which would also suggest just a cameo). I like the idea of the Netflix characters popping up in each other's shows and I hope we get more of it.

Finn Jones has started training for the next season of Iron Fist. If we can take his previous comments literally (that he's training for 4-5 months) than we can expect filming to begin in January or February (completing in July/August and production completed October/November).

Just an incidental about the show: I've been pointing out for awhile that it's far more popular than given credit for, but it's true that it is the only show that people actively hate. While other shows have disliked elements, they don't get active hate. Iron Fist is pretty polarizing--people either liked it or they actively despise it (interestingly, the latter are often fans of the comics). Overcoming the latter sentiment is probably going to require critical praise, but whether that ship has sailed or not remains to be seen.

There has been very little buzz about the Runaways even though it's just two months away (perhaps NYCC will change that). One interesting thing about it is that MCU guru Kevin Feige has a producer credit for the show, which is highly unusual for Marvel TV (the only other TV property he's been involved with was Agent Carter)--I wonder what brought him to the Hulu project?

A thought going back to the news that The Defenders viewership numbers in the US were low: whatever feedback Netflix gets on why this is can't be incorporated into plans for Jessica Jones season two (filming is complete), Luke Cage season two (filming is ongoing), or have much impact on Daredevil season three (filming will start soon so the scripts and storyline are already done). I think the lesson has already been learned however, as Netflix waived goodbye to the Hand--both JJ and LC would have more grounded stories anyway, and it's clear DD3 will follow suit (I have no idea what Iron Fist season two will be like--scripts are likely still being written for it and the only known change is that Finn Jones will be better at Kung Fu--see above).

The Gifted, despite critical praise, is receiving a very muted response (eg Emergency Awesome's Charlie Schneider bailed on plans to make videos about it). I watched it and it looked exactly like what you'd expect a Bryan Singer-directed pilot would look like: everything is dark, gritty, and firmly rooted in 1980s X-Men themes. I thought the acting was largely histrionic (clearly a product of the directing), with the plot unimaginative and derivative. Polaris was the best thing about the show and while things could improve a lot needs to change for it to succeed. The metaphor of mutants as a prosecuted minority without set-up doesn't really work anymore--superheroes have broad popular appeal so the conceit requires actual buy-in (they have to be presented as a threat first), which the show doesn't attempt. Not much effort is put Polaris' crew (Jamie Chung's Blink is a big step down from Bingbing Fan's in Days of Future Past), while the Strucker family comes across as bland and generic (with Lauren unsympathetic and annoying and her brother Andy simply annoying). Will the show be a success? It's hard to say, but the lack of buzz and the heavy competition from other superhero shows means it has a tough hill to climb (and how do you continue to seem gritty when The Punisher drops?).

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)