Yeah, that was an incredibly strong show from start to finish. I loved every minute of it.
I think the final episode was the only one that didn’t manage to feel even better than the ones before, but it was still great. An excellent first season, and it’s hard to believe how good we have it that a new season of Fargo is just around the corner.
Also, make sure to watch to the end of the credits.
So, thoughts:
[spoiler]
I had figured out several episodes back that the parasite was Amahl Farouk (patting myself on the back!). I dug out that issue of X-Men and shows him to my wife. It is Uncanny X-Men #117 if anyone wants to check it out.
The timeline fits, since that issue is a flashback to before Xavier ever formed the X-Men. But it would also seem to imply that Xavier is the father of Haller. They’ve even teased us several times with the “X” shaped wheel on the wheelchair. But there’s no way Xavier can be in a Fox property, right? I seem to recall in the comics that Legion is the child of Scott Summer and Jean Gray, but whatever, comic backstory re-writes are too common to keep track of. But tying him to Farouk and so to Xavier is an interesting tidbit.[/spoiler]
I’ve never read the relevant comics, but my understanding was David was Xavier’s son in everything so far. Cable was Jean and Scott’s kid.
Fox has the X-Men movies, and Legion is clearly dealing with mutants (the forbidden word on the ABC/Disney Marvel Cinematic Universe); everything I’ve read says Fox has the same rights to the characters for the shows that they do to the films.
The complicated part would be if they wanted to get any of the same actors involved.
Ah, okay, Cable vs Legion. I gave up on reading any of the X-Men material before either of those characters existed (I can’t stand Bill Sienkiewicz’s work, and the writing had gone to absolute shit about the same time, so I just quit on it).
Getting any of the current actors wouldn’t really make any sense anyway. Stewart would be way too old for any role except as a flashback, and even James McAvoy would be a bit long in the tooth to try and cast him that early.
So if Xavier is the father, who is the mother? Moira McTaggert?
Davids mother is Gabrielle Haller, she is a holocaust survivor who Xavier saves and falls in love with. This takes place near the end of WW2 and fairly early in Prof X’s life.
Of course none of this may apply to the current TV version of David. Though it does seem credible since David’s full name is David Haller. Also considering the time frame of David’s birth McAvoy would work just fine.
Speaking of time frames… the show did a great job establishing that this is a completely different world than the one we live in. The outfits and decorations are very 60’s/70’s, but there is a mix of modern and old-school technology. There are also several references to things that occurred in the 2000’s as well as some dialog that implies it’s a modern-day setting as opposed to retro. This was all apparently by design.
From Noah Hawley, the show’s creator:
When I wrote the script I assumed it was set in present day and in our world, and I think the network assumed that too. Then when it came time to make it I thought about it more as a fable on some level and I realized I wanted to make something subjective. Which is to say this whole show is not the world, it’s David’s experience of the world. He’s piecing his world together from nostalgia and memory and the world becomes that. I found myself watching A Clockwork Orange and Quadrophenia and a lot of ’60s British films. Yet there are elements that are futuristic too. You’ll notice there’s only one car in the whole first hour, and not many in the whole season, because cars really date something. Costume wise Clockwork had a specific look to it that I wanted to play with. I wanted to create a world that had its own rules, and that was about putting you into David’s head and seeing things that are there or aren’t there. You wonder: Who is this guy if everything he’s thought about himself is wrong?
That led me to believe that much of what we are seeing was in David’s head. At one point I honestly thought every character in the show was imagined. But the explanation that we are viewing the world through his eyes (so to speak) makes a lot of sense.
The clockwork orange references were right up front in the first episode, but there was one particular shot of David in episode 5 or so where he looked eerily like Malcolm McDowell’s Alex.
What an incredible show. That silent film sequence in episode 7…just jaw-droppingly good. Now what the heck is up with the flying orb that sucks up David in the post-credits scene?!
I believe this sorta answers that question:
What a great first season. Episode 7, in particular, with the blackboard scenes, and Logical, Analytical David was really good.
If Netflix’s Marvel shows were even half the quality of this show, I would eat them up. Why can’t they be good too? That’s Marvel too. But of course, it’s different show runners, different writers, etc. It’s a shame.
This is one of those rare shows where you feel like every frame, every costume, every line, every touch of make-up, every prop on the set, every color represented on the walls, ever single detail has been specifically designed for a purpose and has a reason for being what it is as part of this vision for the show.
Well, it’s not even Marvel, really, in the sense those other shows are. It’s Fox.
Well, I was just reminded of the Marvel thing in every episode, because every episode starts with a stylish “FX Presents” “in association with Marvel Television”. So even though it doesn’t feel like other Marvel shows, it just made me wish that this is what other Marvel shows should feel like.
(And by that, I don’t mean they should feel surreal, just that the quality of the production here is on a whole other level).
Daredevil isn’t as good as Legion, but it’s pretty close. Daredevil (season 1 at least) gets full credit from me for being an appropriate take on the character, not beholden to the tone and formula of the movies (or Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.).
It’s easy to pick on Netflix now as we plot the downward arc in quality from subsequent series, but I think DD deserves credit for being a really great show.
I couldn’t make it past 5 or 6 episodes of DD, it was just too boring for me. At least I made it all the way through JJ, despite being bored of all the filler episodes and material that stretched it out to a long season.
I can’t quite put my finger on what bothers me so much in that show. The acting is competent. The writing is competent. The lighting and sound is almost competent. But it all just adds up to nothing that compels to me to keep watching. Even getting through 6 episodes was like sitting at the doctor’s office for 5 hours with nothing but Reader’s Digest to amuse me.
I really liked DD but the Netflix Marvel series have produced diminishing returns as each one has come out. And none of them come even close to Legion. [quote=“Rock8man, post:71, topic:120503”]
evey single detail has been specifically designed for a purpose and has a reason for being what it is as part of this vision for the show.
[/quote]
This is dead on. The way the show is structured and presented is masterful, as is the attention to detail. In an interview with Noah Hawley he talked about how you rarely see a vehicle in the show because they tend to fix time frames with their presence and when they did have a car they chose ones that were somewhat timeless in appearance. The ambiguity of when was important to Noah as it helped feed the mystery surrounding David.
Finished watching season 1 yesterday. I was obviously aboard the hype train having browsed through some comments here and reading a review over at imdb, but I still wasn’t prepared for such an unbelievable ride. A fantastic show in every way. I couldn’t find anything to complain about even if I tried.
Well I decided to give Legion a summer reviewing. I wont say that it is better the 2nd time around but instead it is different in a very good way. The ambiguity you experience during your first viewing is a huge part of the ride but on a 2nd viewing you have the benefit of an informed perspective and suddenly things make sense as you view them and a lot of little things that may have seemed just weird have meaning. For a lot of tv, knowing too much going in risks diminishing the enjoyment and I wouldn’t have wanted to know as much as I do now prior to my first viewing but even with knowing where everything is headed, its still a fantastic ride.
I am 3 episodes in and not sure if I want to stick with it. I am not loving it… :|