REVIEW: Marvel's Inhumans "Divide and Conquer"
Did anybody else forget that this thing went on for longer than two episodes? Because I sure did. Not that the premiere had any sense of conclusion, not even close, but there was distinct lack of caring what happened to these people. Nevertheless, they continued, whether we wanted them to or not. And I still don’t.
The third episode shows no signs of improving over the glaring flaws of last week with the weird designs, wonky acting, and unoriginal plotting. Even taking the time away from the moon doesn’t help since we still have to follow the same people. We could be on a lava mountain fighting off hordes of a skeleton army, and that doesn’t change that this is just bizarre.
Even worse, they seem to be falling to one of the worst cardinal sins of television of featuring side characters far more interesting than the main ones. Gorgon fights with a group of former soldiers who ooze an understood loyalty to each other. Karnak crosses paths with a gang of drug planters who take him in despite his weirdness. Crystal meets a guy on a dirt bike. I mean that’s all we know about him, but he has a dirt bike, that’s pretty cool. Even the people who are tracking down Black Bolt have more personality than the entire roster put together.
Also, we’ve almost crossed the boundary of caring about Medusa as a person much less as a character. I don’t know what she wants, why she wants it, or why we’re not supposed to be concerned that she’s stealing stuff and kidnapping women. Maybe it’s desperation, but I don’t know what’s so desperate about it. This wouldn’t be a problem if she wasn’t supposed to be the fricking female lead…and if the next episode didn’t seem to revolve around her.
Finally, the flashbacks. I admire that the younger actors seem to have the concept of expression down, but there’s absolutely nothing new from them. Except maybe that Black Bolt’s real name is actually Black Bolt, and that’s more funny than tragic. Black Bolt suffering a long time with his powers isn’t something that needs to be hammered in to us, and the show only wastes precious time trying to pretend it does.
However, there does seem to be an upside in this episode not being the premiere. Instead of wasting time on introducing everyone and their ridiculous backstories, we jump into the sort of action. Now instead of a dragging out a boring story, we go into slightly less boring fighting and characters actually doing something rather than talking about it, even if it took about three episodes to do that.
Yeah, I also have to admit that scene at the prison had something interesting to it. From the Inhuman prisoner to the wealthy investor to wherever the heck they’re headed was more interesting than wandering the city. Compared to Medusa and Maximus (whom I haven’t mentioned merely because he’s just not that interesting), Black Bolt is far from the worst character, and his interactions with others are innocent enough to watch. Does that mean the show will redeem itself? Of course not, but these plots won’t be the thing that brings it down.
That’s what I think about the rest of these stories anyway. Even Crystal on Earth with Lockjaw has some possibilities. It’s great that the show put forth some effort to designing some plot for these people to muddle through for at least an hour. Some shows put forth more with an interesting twist or deeper character meanings, but this can make the show more bearable. Not recommendable, but just not the worst thing on television today.
Alas, the show is still a drag with little action or original plotting. Some decent background characters with some motion won’t change that and probably couldn’t even if it was surprising. The sad part is sooner or later it won’t even be fun to point that out anymore.
