Mel O'Drama
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Moon Knight
Season One (2022)
The Goldfish Problem / Summon The Suit / The Friendly Type
Season One (2022)
The Goldfish Problem / Summon The Suit / The Friendly Type
Five-and-a-half months on from Hawkeye, Phase Four resumes.
For me it’s often a plus when an MCU project features a character towards whom I've never previously felt particularly connected. Moon Knight certainly fits that profile.
He’s one of those characters that I feel I know because I’m familiar with his name, costume and Marc Spector alter ego. But when I stop and think about it, I struggle to remember reading a single specific comic in which he appeared. I dare say he was somewhere on the periphery, but he’s never been a character I remember from any of my regular titles.
That’s not to say I didn’t find aspects of the character appealing. I especially loved the cowl and cape, which reminded me of Hobgoblin or Cloak (though it’s fairer to say that they stole his look, since he was around many years before either one).
I must say I don’t remember any of the dissociative personality stuff or the Steven Grant alter. And the visuals of him chaining himself to his bed in fear at nighttime reminded me far more of Marvel’s Jack Russell than Moon Knight. I also know nothing of the supporting characters, so there’s no risk of getting hung up on whether or not they’re faithful translations in the way that I did with Jessica Jones’s Trish Walker.
I seem to remember it was felt the character was essentially a Marvel take on Batman, and in many ways it’s pleasing that the series is finding a tone that’s far removed from the Dark Knight.
The opening episode in particular was enjoyably disorientating, even having scanned a brief synopsis (unavoidable when clicking through to stream episodes sometimes). The blackouts. The voices (appearing on different speaker channels to add to the confusion). It all felt extremely subjective, almost to the point of discomfort.
Having pieces of the puzzle which are slowly put together over the first few episodes makes for an interactive and immersive experience, and that’s been a good thing.
Tonally, I hoped this series was going to flow well immediately after some one hundred and sixty one episodes of Marvel’s Netflix series. I got quite a gritty, noir-ish vibe from the teaser trailer, which seemed similar to series such as Daredevil. It is pretty dark in places, but doesn’t feel as oppressive as the Netflix series because it’s balanced out by lighter moments.
At first I found the humour very welcome, and I’ve laughed out loud at a few little character-based moments. The banter between Steven and Snarky Donna, his manager at the gift shop has been a joy, and Oscar Isaac has injected a great deal of natural humour into Steven’s responses to the situations. His little utterance of “oh bollocks” in response to a threat was hilarious. And there’s always gold to be mined in amnesia, particularly when he bumps into someone who tells him she’s his wife. Even the cupcake van chase set to the tune of Wham!’s Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go worked really well because we were still learning about the character and trying to figure things out and it was told in such an interesting way.
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