Marvel's "The Inhumans"

Started by Shogunn2517, November 15, 2016, 02:35:49 AM

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Shogunn2517

http://marvel.com/news/tv/26993/marvels_the_inhumans_coming_to_imax_abc_in_2017?linkId=31155906

So apparently... This will be a new series to debut on ABC in the fall, however the first two episodes will premiere theatrically in IMAX during the summer of 2017.

Is this effectively just a spinoff of Marvel's "Agents of SHIELD"?

catwhowalksbyhimself

So I guess the movie is out then.  As extensively as Agents has used them, this makes more sense.

As for being a spinoff of Agents, while I expect the shows to crossover and make reference to each other, Agents has left alone the royal family and most of the comic book Inhuman characters.  Most of the ones on the show are either original characters or weren't Inhumans in the comics, with Lash being the major exception.  So I expect it to have an entirely separate cast and mostly just acknowledge the situation with Inhumans as it exists on Agents.
I am the cat that walks by himself, all ways are alike to me.

Talavar

I have to say I'm not overly optimistic about this.  It's ABC, the channel bringing us 4 seasons of mediocre Agents of Shield, but there's also the matter of a tv budget.  Unless this gets an HBO-style budget (which I'm almost certain it won't) it's going to suffer for it.

Tomato

Yeah... I'm not enthusiastic. Based on what I know about the situation at Marvel, this seems like something done more to urine certain people off than as a part of a sound business move on Marvel TV's part.

For those not in the know, Inhumans had been shoehorned into the Marvel film docket for a long time, and was only recently taken off once Disney cut Marvel CEO Isaac Perlmutter out of the films and gave control to creative lead Kevin Feige. The only reason we've had the property constantly shoehorned into Marvel media (we're on what, season 3 of Inhuman subplots in SHIELD) is because Inhumans was Perlmutter's way of giving Fox studios a big fat middle finger for their control of the X-men property, and even with the shakeup on the film end, Perlmutter is still in charge of Marvel TV. Now, with Fox coming out with their own mutant-centered TV show, this announcement REEKS of Perlmutter rushing out a sub-par TV show to steal away views.

Jimaras8

Considering AOS is the best netowrk cb show right (excluding the Netflix) shows i'm excited. marvel really owns tv and movies!!!

Shogunn2517

http://www.cbr.com/abcs-inhumans-characters-revealed-in-call-sheet/?utm_source=CBR-TW&utm_medium=Social-Distribution&utm_campaign=CBR-TW&view=list

Apparently information has leaked of a breakdown of character breakdowns for series regulars.  Those characters are: "Broderick", "Majorie", "Marty", "Kevin", "Grady", "Christine", and "Timothy".

Can't imagine how "spoiler-ish" that material is actually.  Read the link if you want know more.

Silver Shocker

Game of Thrones' Iwan Rheon, aka Ramsay Bolton, will play Maximus the Mad.

Amazing casting. Not only does Ramsay know his way around that kind of villainous cad, he even looks the part! I now have a reason to want to watch the Inhumans, something I honestly didn't think possible. And while Marvel may draw criticism for their movie villains, they've actually done really well with their tv villains, so he'll probably continue that tradition.
"Now you know what you're worth? Then go out and get what you're worth, but you gotta be willing to take the hits. And not pointing fingers, saying you're not where you want to be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that, and THAT AIN'T YOU. YOU'RE BETTER THAN THAT!"
~Rocky Balboa

Shogunn2517

Black Bolt  has been cast... and it isn't Vin Diesel.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2017/02/28/marvels-the-inhumans-anson-mount-cast-as-black-bolt

Not a bad choice at all... still REALLY curious how they handle him though.  Masked? Unmasked?  Completely voiceless?  pho-voiced?

BentonGrey

He's a good actor, but I wouldn't have picked him as BB.  I'm curious to see how that will go.
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
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Silver Shocker

Ken Leung from Lost (he played Miles Staum) will play martial artist expert Karnak.

I think it's great that actors I liked in other shows will be in this playing these characters, since it gives me a reason to want to watch it. Though I gotta admit, this won't help the people who complain about the Asian actors in Marvel projects playing martial artists, like Shang Chi.
"Now you know what you're worth? Then go out and get what you're worth, but you gotta be willing to take the hits. And not pointing fingers, saying you're not where you want to be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that, and THAT AIN'T YOU. YOU'RE BETTER THAN THAT!"
~Rocky Balboa

Shogunn2517

#10
So, I watched the premiere episode(s) last night.  Did not catch it at IMAX earlier in the month, but from the reviews it received, I was probably better off saving my money.  But I took the hour and change and DVR space to make up for it.  And my initial impressions: It is "unfortunately bad" in execution and hard to see how they fix the hole they've created.  It's possible over the next six weeks they do, but they'll tank faithful viewers and fans of the brand in the process.

Spoiler
For starters, I will say I'm not the most knowledgeable fan of the Inhumans, but I'm a fan of the MCU and have watched MAOS for the last four years, so I had some expectations, but nothing solid.  I was looking to learn more about the characters, their story and to shine more light on a book/storyline I'm not too familiar with in comics.  I was happy to see characters like Black Bolt and Medusa finally see screen time in live action.

That said, the first scene of the series featured a nameless Inhuman running from three men coming after her and Triton shows up to "save" her.  There's no background to why she's being chased.  No known reason why Triton's trying to find her.  And when he does, the dialogue was ridiculously expository and clunky.  From there, the writing(and acting) really did not get any better.  Thankfully, the stars of the show did not do bad with what they had.  Mount, Swan, Rheon, and Leung did well.  But outside of that the acting was not really well done.  The writing however, was incredibly and surprisingly bad too.  Like noticeably bad.  I'm not one typically to complain about these things, I am able to accept some situations and scenes just to see the story advance, but a lot of this didn't make sense.  The plot holes were ridiculous.  The action was uninspiring.  Why does Medusa whup a squad of soldiers asses, but lets Maximus give her a haircut (with a pair of clippers on the moon)?  Why does Black Bolt feel the need to go all GQ?  Why does Lockjaw drop everyone off across the entire state of Hawaii?  What are Karnak's powers?  Math?  Time Travel?  Who are these two from NASA?  Why does the guards all of sudden feel okay betraying the king and queen and doing what Maximus wants them to?  The show just seems all over the map and doesn't make much sense and they don't explain it well at all.

Unfortunately, I'll watch next week.  They seem to be introducing other characters so it might pick up, but so far this is by far the worse thing Marvel's put out.

And again, it sucks because I wanted to like it.  I wanted to know more about it, but it's borderline unwatchable.  That's saying something because this is coming from someone that watched Iron Fist and ENJOYED it.  This is on a whole other level.  If it keeps up, I may not care to finish and that's hard to imagine because I've been able to find redeeming qualities in almost anything Marvel has done.  But this is problematic.

BentonGrey

Ouch, harsh Shogunn!  Yikes, that does not sound good at all!  I wasn't expecting it to be particularly good, but this sounds worse than I expected.
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

Deaths Jester

The Inhumans were always best as support characters, both in the comics and on the tele. This show just goes to support that. They need someone like the FF to play off of or they fall flat on their faces cause writers don't know what to do with them.
Avatar picture originally a Brom painting entitled Marionette.

crimsonquill

#13
I'm not a HUGE fan of the Inhumans but with FOX's death grip on "mutants" the MCU kinda has been forced to push Inhumans into the "random power giver/transformation source" without even being able to pull in Fantastic Four's family and cosmic world to expand into. The Royal Family was the trickiest part because they have a very huuuuuuge Kirby influence in their designs which makes them fit perfectly into the visual style of Thor Ragnarok but probably not so easily within the lower-budget world of Agents Of SHIELD. Something tells me that Nuhumans (Quake and probably many more newly transformed Inhumans) will be a huge factor in the later story arcs in Season Five once they return to Earth and probably bringing in some of the cast from the Inhumans show to repair some of the inconsistencies from their mini series (allowing that arc to be their official MCU introduction as supporting characters FIRST then spin them off).  From the casting I don't really see any problems, it's really all within the scripting and the rushed design work on the sets and costumes that everyone seems to be locking onto.

Spoiler

Just from watching the pilot (and once again not being a super fan of the Inhumans comics) it just comes across as an okay story with very little hand holding for new audiences to these characters. We got very quick intros of each of the Royal family but not really any explanation of their powers outside of Medusa, Black Bolt, Gorgon, Lockjaw, and a vague visualization of Karnak's talent. Only hard core fans of Inhumans would have recognized Triton in his short appearance and those fans could really only laugh at the idea that he could have drowned after being wounded so easily. I had to pull out some Marvel Handbooks to remind myself of Maximus's talents and it completely seems obvious that the writers and/or show runner didn't know his powers beyond being the mad scientist brother of Black Bolt or they are letting that play out as a twist over the course of the mini series. That would explain some of the confusing things of why someone who is "human" can influence people but not others. Is it his charisma or something else? It also appears that the genetic council in the Inhumans colony on Earth in season two of Agents Of SHIELD was the cream of the crop because it seems the moon version couldn't recognize the abilities of the precog at all even when it's seems to be activated by touch. More and more I keep getting the impression that mental powers are a very new power set within the MCU (almost seems that telepathy/telekinesis/precognition are so attached to Professor X, Jean Grey, Psylocke, Cable, and so forth that unless the character is vague about their ability writers are not allowed to address them as a power unless it's within the X-Men movies/series themselves).

I'm going to be watching the rest of the episodes counting down the days to Season Five of AOS but I'm still hoping that everything improves from here or ABC really showed their hand early by changing the "first season" to "complete series" in the recent promotions by killing any future of the series before it really got launched.

- CQ
"He said let there be light... CLICK! It was a lightbulb. And It was good."

Shogunn2517

Quote from: BentonGrey on September 30, 2017, 09:58:33 PM
Ouch, harsh Shogunn!  Yikes, that does not sound good at all!  I wasn't expecting it to be particularly good, but this sounds worse than I expected.

Yeah.  Perhaps it may seemed I judged too harshly.  I'm effectively where CQ is.  Again, I will be watching it.  And I wasn't like completely turned off by it.  It just seemed rather uninspired and fairly boring.

But again, we'll see if it picks up any.

Deaths Jester

If memory serves me right Maximus has the ability to override people's thoughts.
Avatar picture originally a Brom painting entitled Marionette.

crimsonquill

#16
Quote from: Deaths Jester on October 01, 2017, 04:10:03 AM
If memory serves me right Maximus has the ability to override people's thoughts.

Correct, Which I assume will come into play as how he turned Attilan security against the Royals but either he doesn't have full control OR is hiding his emerged powers until he absolutely needs to play that card in public view. Otherwise he could have just flipped everyone he came into contact with without grand speeches or needing to resort to taking down the inner circle around Black Bolt behind the scenes.

It just seems like an odd play to make his power the "It's A Twist" moment once Maximus gets to Earth and takes control of people there instead of his hidden stealth commandos.

- CQ
"He said let there be light... CLICK! It was a lightbulb. And It was good."

Deaths Jester

Remember CQ, that Maximus is nuts so he doesn't always think about the best way to get what he wants (take control of everyone would be best but that's no fun). Also, if memory serves me right, people could withstand Maximus' power pretty easily in the comics. Blackbolt and most of the others withstood Maxi's powers, it always seemed to be those that secretly thought the same way that succumbed to Maxi.
Avatar picture originally a Brom painting entitled Marionette.

HarryTrotter

Is it a terrible and cheap as trailers made it out to be?
At this point,either Jeph Loeb is still loyal to DC or hes laundering tons of money here.
''Even our origin stories have gone sour.''
Jon Farmer

Tomato

Or this entire show is a vanity project of Ike Perlmutter that was rushed out because FOX is making multiple X-men shows and Inhumans have been Ike's way of giving Fox the middle finger.

I dunno, this whole thing just baffles me. Perlmutter is a notorious spendthrift (famously trying to take away Stan Lee's salary because it wasn't "necessary") but how many thousands of dollars are being spent here for what is essentially a vanity project. It boggles me.

crimsonquill

Quote from: Tomato on October 05, 2017, 03:52:15 PM
Or this entire show is a vanity project of Ike Perlmutter that was rushed out because FOX is making multiple X-men shows and Inhumans have been Ike's way of giving Fox the middle finger.

I dunno, this whole thing just baffles me. Perlmutter is a notorious spendthrift (famously trying to take away Stan Lee's salary because it wasn't "necessary") but how many thousands of dollars are being spent here for what is essentially a vanity project. It boggles me.

Thankfully Perlmutter is now out of the picture thanks to his more political interests (Perlmutter got tons of flack for donating tons of Marvel's money for Trump's election) because he was placed in charge of Military Veterans Affairs within Trump's cabnet which means that Jeph Loeb has stepped up into full control. Thankfully Loeb has better relations with FOX AND Sony which is allowing more deals behind the scenes to be made for Television projects and Marvel Comics current "Legacy" rebirth which is bringing back Fantastic Four and X-Men (which were being held back in promotional materials and comics because Perlmutter hated FOX so much he didn't want to see anything that reminded him of the characters they "owned").

- CQ
"He said let there be light... CLICK! It was a lightbulb. And It was good."

HarryTrotter

Loebs track record isnt that great either.Take a look at any Marvel cartoon really.
''Even our origin stories have gone sour.''
Jon Farmer

crimsonquill

Quote from: HarryTrotter on October 06, 2017, 04:26:08 AM
Loebs track record isnt that great either.Take a look at any Marvel cartoon really.

Loeb is going to be way too busy behind the desk in the main Marvel office to be in the writers rooms or any of the comic book retreats that used to be part of. Loeb's biggest problems were the huge multi-realities Marvel was always juggling which is usually why the comics and cartoons that he was directly involved with always made no sense (Ultimate Spider-Man talking directly to the camera which was Deadpool's territory of 4th wall breaking and the mess that Agents Of SMASH started off with right out of the gate plus Rick Jones also doing 4th wall breaking with his video logs which expanded to the whole cast). Deadpool (coming very soon), Marvel's Spider-Man (the new series), and Guardians Of The Galaxy have all stepped up their game in the animation departments.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to episode 3 of Inhumans tomorrow and better things to come.. Hell, I'm thrilled just with getting ANY Marvel  news from NYCC this weekend.

- CQ
"He said let there be light... CLICK! It was a lightbulb. And It was good."

HarryTrotter

Okay,but why do they all look like Johnny Test?Surely,they have an animation budget?
''Even our origin stories have gone sour.''
Jon Farmer

Silver Shocker

Quote from: Tomato on October 05, 2017, 03:52:15 PM
Or this entire show is a vanity project of Ike Perlmutter that was rushed out because FOX is making multiple X-men shows and Inhumans have been Ike's way of giving Fox the middle finger.

I dunno, this whole thing just baffles me. Perlmutter is a notorious spendthrift (famously trying to take away Stan Lee's salary because it wasn't "necessary") but how many thousands of dollars are being spent here for what is essentially a vanity project. It boggles me.

I actually do enjoy the occasions when you rail against the Inhumans, since I makes me feels less like a broken record for complaining about it as much as I do.

That being sad..

I didn't hate it. In fact, I actually quite enjoyed it. I didn't get as much out of this week's episode, but the pilot I was fine with. Keep in mind I have a fairly large bias as I mentioned above because of Iwan Rheon and Ken Leung, but still. Serinda Swan I thought was pretty good, Anson Mount's fabulous facial expressions are endlessly amusing (though, like the show itself, not as good in this week's episode) and the dog's pretty amusing. Now, I've literally been thinking to myself for months "It'd have to actively try to suck as bad as the last two and a half seasons of Agents of Shield" (thank goodness that show's dying this year), but still, I've always been there complaining about the "Inhuman B.S." as I call it. If I thought it sucked, I'd be right here saying it sucked and being really self-satisfied about it. But it didn't IMO. My viewing crowd also enjoyed it more than they thought they would.

QuoteMount, Swan, Rheon, and Leung did well.  But outside of that the acting was not really well done

Am I the only one who thought Crystal was the worst actor in the show by a wide margin? It's too bad because she's just about the only Inhuman Royal Family Member I actually really like (if for no other reason than her history with Quicksilver, though I did enjoy her in War of Kings) and the actress is cute. Though I could swear her acting got a little better in this week's episode.

QuoteDeadpool (coming very soon), Marvel's Spider-Man (the new series), and Guardians Of The Galaxy have all stepped up their game in the animation departments.

Umm, have we seen Deadpool yet? That's news to me. While I agree that Spider-Man and Guardians are pretty good, I also feel the need to stress: Avengers Assemble has gotten a LOT better since season 1 and I mean a LOT. I honestly think anyone who watches to the end of season 3 would have to concede that. For example, they did Civil War with the Inhumans and not only was it not terrible it was actually pretty damn good. And yes, I must bring this up, it's still 100% objectively indefensible that Canada is still getting the show a year late. My favorite part of Marvel's Spider-Man is the fact that it's a new series on Disney XD which means I actually get to see it at the same time as everyone else. At least Marvel's not spoiling Avengers Assemble in the pages of the comics every week like they did the last two years (they also did it for Spidey).

QuoteI dunno, this whole thing just baffles me. Perlmutter is a notorious spendthrift (famously trying to take away Stan Lee's salary because it wasn't "necessary") but how many thousands of dollars are being spent here for what is essentially a vanity project. It boggles me.

Perlmutter's a rat fink, but I can't find it in my heart of hearts to be as bitter about the Inhuman B.S. as I used to be. The M-Pox is finally gone, the X-Books are actually about X-Men stuff again, and I might be wrong but I could swear the Inhuman's aren't intruding into as many books as they used to. Beyond that, The thing about this show is

1. Shield hasn't had any actual MCU stuff for Inhumans to get in the way of for years anyway (and yes, I'm aware of the irony that that's a cause-and-effect OF the Inhuman B.S. but damnit season 4 was marginally better than season 3 and we got a pretty cool version of Ghost Rider I'm gonna let that slide)

2. If this were the alternate universe where the Inhuman B.S. never happen (and how i wish I lived there) this would just be seen as one of Marvel's "experiments" alongside Ant-Man, Agent Carter, and Guardians prior to Guardians actually coming out and becoming everyone's favorite thing ever. As I've mentioned as a few times to my viewing group, so far it's not even an Agents of Shield spin-off in any overt way. It's just a show that stars the Inhumans Royal Family. Fairly innocuous.

Now, you want something Inhuman B.S. related to actually get righteously indignant about, since we already brought it up? Marvel banned the entire X-Men family of characters from appearing in the new Marvel vs. Capcom game. Despite 1. Those characters being some of the most popular in the series and 2. MVC itself being spun off from some X-Men games by Capcom. When asked about the it, the official statement was "We left it out because noone knows who the X-Men are" which is seriously one of the most laughably pathetic P.R. statements I've ever heard in my life, and I'm a human being living in the year 2017.
"Now you know what you're worth? Then go out and get what you're worth, but you gotta be willing to take the hits. And not pointing fingers, saying you're not where you want to be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that, and THAT AIN'T YOU. YOU'RE BETTER THAN THAT!"
~Rocky Balboa

BentonGrey

#25
So, I watched episode 2, having missed the first one.  I was not impressed.

It isn't terrible, but it isn't good either.  The acting on the whole was about on par with what I've come to expect from these types of shows, some decent, some pretty rough, and the writing was weak to middling throughout.  The thing that bothered me most, however, is not bad dialog or bad delivery, but how they are completely wasting all the best qualities of the imaginative, fantastic setting they've inherited with these characters.  The Inhumans are a colorful and diverse lot, no two alike.  That's part of their charm and their attraction.
https://marswillsendnomore.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/jack-kirby-inhumans-002.jpg

The riot of color and form, the variety of fantastical designs and strange shapes, all of that is completely abandoned in favor of exactly what we've seen from the rest of these shows.  Attilan is white and gray corridors, the Inhumans are a bunch of regular looking folks, all dressed in black, black, and more black.  Medusa and Crystal are literally the only ones I saw wearing anything with color.  It's insane to think that these shows are, at least in theory, connected to the wonderfully colorful and imaginative Marvel films.  It's like the TV portion of their universe is still stuck in 2005, during the days when color was banished from film.  I know that some of this is a matter of budget.  I'm sure they can't afford big, elaborate sets and incredibly complicated costuming, but they could at least paint some of their background in humans different colors!  For goodness sakes, there's nothing to distinguish these 'superior beings' from the cast of SHIELD!

The show is also guilty of one of the prime sins of Hollywood.  You introduce cool characters and settings with tons of fun abilities and cool toys, and then, at the end of the first act, you immediately strip all of the stuff that makes them interesting away, so that the show/movie becomes about those characters trying to recover their cool stuff.  For some reason, this is a go-to for screenwriters, despite the fact that such a move usually squanders the wonder and excitement they spent the first act building up. 
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
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Deaths Jester

Wait, you were expecting them to wear colours, BG?!? In this century with so much black and white everywhere?!? OMG!! ;P
Avatar picture originally a Brom painting entitled Marionette.

BentonGrey

#27
Haha, we're in a post Marvel movie universe and specifically Guardians of the Galaxy world.  There's absolutely no excuse to be afraid of color any more!  :P

I watched episode 3 today, and I am less impressed than ever.  A significant part of the problem is that they've got all these separate plots and separate supporting characters going, and I just really don't care about a solid 75% of them.  I really could not be less interested in Crystal's new farmer boyfriend and his ex.  The main plot is relatively interesting, and if there were more than five people in Attilan, they might really have something with the world they are terrified of actually creating there.  Yet, what they spend most of the show on is just not that interesting.  There are moments when Medusa and her new Girl Friday are pretty entertaining, but those are not necessarily the rule, especially when the delivery of backstory and exposition through whatsherface is just painfully ham-handed.  It's such a crying shame.
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

Shogunn2517

That's funny.  I actually thought the show had picked up over the first few episodes.  Unfortunately it wasn't enough.  I've lost enough interest to have not watched the last few episodes.  Not sure if I'll get through tonight....

Actually started reading this thread again to see if there's reason for me to do so and I'm not seeing it.

daglob

I saw an article on The Inhumans saying that they have been losing about half their audience ever week. I prefer the version that was on the late, lamented auntpetunia.com.