"Inhumans" review

Marvel. Stop. Hiring. Scott. Buck.


Apparently the Faustian pact that Marvel has made to launch a multimedia franchise utilizing their successful cinematic crossovers as an anchor for fairly successful television endeavors has finally come around to collect.

The “Marvel Cinematic Universe” has thus far done an excellent job in maintaining certain quality control standards to a T, year after year for nearly a decade so I guess it only makes sense that when they do mess up, it happens big, loudly, and bizarrely, such as hiring the same guy to tank 2 of your properties in 2 of the worst productions of the entire enterprise, bar none, as if to say “oh, you thought this couldn’t get any lamer than ‘Agents of SHIELD?’ Well have we got a specialist for you!”

In any case, if you’ve been following Marvel drama for the last few years as much as I have, you’ll know that the road to “Inhumans” has been paved with a lot of corporate cynicism and melodrama.

The final product that will be coming to ABC in a few weeks more or less faithfully represents its property; ages ago, an alien civilization experimented on humanity and abandoned the ancient Earth, leaving behind the unaltered human race along with an off shoot with super powers eventually coming to call themselves Inhumans. The Inhumans have isolated themselves from humanity to create their own government and culture ruled by a royal family currently consisting of Black Bolt, a telepath whose weaponized voice could threaten the fabric of reality if he spoke, his wife Medusa, her sister Crystal, allies Gorgon and Karnack, and his own powerless brother Maximus, all of whom reside in the Moon based capitol city of Attilan.

While the comic is known for being a “Song of Ice and Fire-esque” political drama with superhero flavoring, focusing on the clashing agendas of the royal family and their perceived attitudes of elitism regarding super powered individuals, non-powered inhumans, and isolation from humanity and the galaxy at large, Marvel has made it no secret that in a perfect world, their attempt to make this series a full on replacement for the X-Men, for which they currently lack the live action adaptation rights to, would have gone off without a hitch.

Fortunately backlash to failed comics and efforts in “Agents of SHIELD” to graft the “X-Men” minority rights allegory narrative onto the property have resulted in a more proper adaptation seen on the IMAX screen this weekend. Unfortunately, it doesn’t quite help the quality of the final product.

“Inhumans” is a fundamentally sound idea brimming with potential but the high concept science fiction elements and imagery woven into immaculate writing that preys on an organic clash of personal drama and sociopolitical actions and ideals would have been tricky to pull off on cable television even with a worthwhile budget. So who the hell thought that this would have been a decent fit on ABC, a network channel slowly becoming characterized by trite, low budget, overproduced and one note programming whose only debatable saving grace is 2 decent sitcoms, one of which is on a ticking clock by premise alone.

An ABC “Inhumans” series was always going to be doomed on some level but not content with the ripple effects that the disastrous “Iron Fist” left in its wake, for some reason, the folks at Marvel saw fit to snatch series showrunner Scott Buck back for another rush job.

The result is a clunky, awkwardly plotted, fractured mess of a story that seems to sideline its more fascinating concepts in favor of more mundane dramatic vehicles in a production so laughable that it makes Syfy Channel original movies look as comparatively subdued as 13 year old episodes of “Star Trek: Enterprise.”

I’d lambast the overall cheap aesthetic of costuming and special effects even further in questioning why they thought network television would be a decent avenue for this but even the choice of media release hold little excuse. For all the problems with the “DC Universe” shows on the CW in the writing room, they at least managed to uphold a certain aesthetic and production standard that makes each series feel fully viable within their own context.

“Inhumans” looks terrible despite being apparently funded by IMAX themselves and can’t even have the decency to be passably produced beyond its budgetary constraints.

Every action scene ranges from pedestrian to laughably stiff, which are not words one wants to associate in reference to internal combat between a society of superhuman beings. The sparse sets and locales undermine the intended scope of the story, which combined with the low quality CGI and costuming, make the whole affair come across as a low budget fan film.

Beyond the poor filmmaking of the pilot episodes however, there are instances of editing that are so jarring I found myself more doubled over in laughter than in any comedy that I’ve seen this year, including a cut of a character jumping off of an island ledge into the ocean below, which is so clearly a studio warehouse’s pool of water shot in close up that I had to hang my head in shame realizing that an apparently big budget Marvel television production can’t sell its own reality as well as decent decade old seasons of “Power Rangers.”

Just about the only thing that manages to save “Inhumans” from being as astonishingly terrible as something like “Iron Fist” is that not all of its components crumble from the same slapdash execution of a misguided vision that left the aforementioned series with nothing to work with.

The high concept nature of the show was always going to lend itself to some inherently schlocky visuals despite the bungled production so the strength of the base idea continues to shine through during the best and worst moments of the pilot.

Gorgon being forced to bond with humans that he always saw as primitive after they manage to save his life provides the human warmth that the show was in desperate need of despite not hanging around often enough and the political debates between Maximus and his royal family for perpetuating a caste system that is clearly detrimental everybody on some level almost left me wondering exactly why I’m supposed to be rooting for the other members of the family as the heroes who are clearly benefiting from institutionalized elitism and bigotry.

Which leads into the best thing about “Inhumans” bar none; the cast puts in the work and it shows.

Everybody is strong on some level. Anson Mount’s commanding presence as Black Bolt is so compelling and layered that you quickly forget he’s managed to communicate with no spoken dialogue until the show needlessly points it out for flat comedic effect. The other royals personalities shine through even if they haven’t quite managed their placement for the grand scheme of the series proper and while Isabelle Cornish’s Crystal becomes rather grating when the show boxes her into being the damsel in distress with attitude that the show doesn’t want to admit is kind of a lame load, she actually left a fairly decent impression before then as the lone source of levity and the young perspective to the rest of the jaded older members.

The real takeaway is Mr. Ramsay Bolton himself, Iwan Rheon, as Maximus, who’s giving Loki a run for his money as one of the better MCU villains thus far but with an actual clear and sympathetic motivation that doesn’t just serve as an excuse for him to be sniveling. At least not yet.

It’s almost a shame, because every time these cast members have to deal with the politics of their position and play off of one another, there’s a clear glimpse of what the show could be, should be and can be if they’re willing to nix it after this season in favor of a cable relaunch with a better showrunner like, Bryan Fuller or Ronald D. Moore.

What we’re instead left with in “Inhumans” is a husk of potential that broadcasts just how little it seem to get its own premise with a generic title sequence that can’t even properly set the tone for anything that actually happens in the episode proper.

4 Terrigen Abominations out of 10