Halo (TV Series)

Yeah, this is a textbook nontroversy.

EDIT-Also, can we get a mod to change the title of this thread. While Showtime is one of many companies involved in the production, it's not going to be on that network.

Edited by ArthurEld on Mar 21st 2022 at 7:38:05 AM

...quite a lot when it's an adaption of those games.

That scene proved they had played the games enough to know exactly what fans of it wanted to see. It was a pretty awesome thing to see, and its a great action sequence. If more video game adaptions took that emulation into account they'd be better-received.

The problem with game adaptions is when they separate themselves from the original. You want to be close while still telling a story, not far away. The best moments in any game adaption for any fan are when they reference the game somehow:

• in the recent Uncharted movie the original voice actor for Nathan Drake cameos and makes a quip about having gone on similar adventures before. There's also scenes where the original game's music starts playing, at least one major action scene is ripped from the second game where Nathan gets thrown from a plane, and the scene where Holland puts on the classic Nathan Drake get-up is a powerful scene.
• In Mortal Kombat there's a gag where Kano is getting his legs swept out from beneath him, so he hops to avoid it and gets hit anyway in a clear visual reference to how MK fights look in-game.
• Sonic 2021 had plenty of visual nods to the games, including a scene where all of Sonic's rings hit the ground almost exactly like in the games.

Anyway, for Halo, its troubling that they "didn't play or discuss the games" at all if that's what they meant since that's what they said. Whether that actually impacts the show itself is to be seen.

I just loathe the mentality of "we have to be different/its not a big deal if they don't follow the game closely." Nobody ever seems to grasp that video game adaptions are better for their similarities rather than their differences. Its why we keep getting these churned out Hollywood adaptions that people have valid issues with - Street Fighter Legend of Chun-Li, Mortal Kombat, Assassin's Creed, Prince of Persia, Hitman, etc.

Edited by FOFD on Mar 23rd 2022 at 4:50:19 AM

I think the "we didn't play or discuss the games" thing is where the disconnect is coming from.

A lot of people are taking it as "they aren't paying any attention to the games and are deliberately ignoring them."

I'm parsing it more as "We aren't taking this project as just a game adaptation, we're approaching it as an entry in a large and expansive fictional universe, where it starting as a game is secondary to the universe as a whole." It's just a weaselwordy way to avoid turning off the non-gamers who might otherwise be interested. I seriously doubt the people involved are completely ignorant of the games, and there will definitely be direct nods and stuff like that, but since it's a TV property, they have to try and make it appeal to more than just the gamers.

And, to be blunt, the reason direct game adaptations don't tend to happen is because they'd make for shit movies or TV shows. Either there's too much narrative to adapt or there's not enough, or the pacing is absolutely bizarre because of extended gameplay sequences. The Assassin's Creed movie was a disaster, but the idea of doing a new story was a good one, because none of the games would make for a good movie. The execution was just a disaster.

Uh...tl;dr: the show needs a wide audience to succeed and telling everyone "it's based on a video game, we're devoted to accurately showing it" will turn off a ton of people who don't play games and who have only really seen or heard of the really bad adaptations.

Edited by Zendervai on Mar 23rd 2022 at 8:38:27 AM

I think the idea that it turns a lot of people off is wrong, and telling everyone, "yes, this is based off a video game" would actually improve the design/reception of these films tremendously for a lot of people. Approaching an adaption from the opposite mindset leads to a lot of bizarre creative decisions and fans getting an inferior version of that thing they liked.

A lot of games have won awards for their strong narratives, many of which could easily translate to the big screen. You can't tell me God of War, Gears of War, Metal Gear Solid, or Splinter Cell, or heck even Halo make for shit movies/TV shows. It's all about in how much you can balance gameplay emulation with the strong stories these games already present.

Halo by itself could make for a great 90-minute film with the right pacing.

Edited by FOFD on Mar 23rd 2022 at 6:19:21 AM

Strict adherence to an established narrative does turn off audiences, there's lots of examples of that.

Audiences don't like the idea of having to do homework to watch a tv show. Hearing "you don't have to read the books/play the games" is a big plus for mass audiences-they just want to turn their show on and enjoy it from there. Nobody ever recommended seeing a performance of Hamlet before watching The Lion King.

The most successful video game adaptation in recent memory (and ever, really) is a prequel, so that audiences didn't have to know which, if any of the main characters were native to the game or original and what changes had been made in their backstory.

Also, the idea that audiences will just gravitate towards a story because it's "good" is flat-out wrong. There are countless examples of "good" tv shows and movies failing to find an audience for many, many reasons besides the work's quality. Audiences go where marketing, nostalgia, word of mouth, spectacle, and accessibility lead them. They don't have any magic ability to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Several examples of when it works better than loose adaptation, too.

There are easy ways to get basic info across to the new audience without drastically altering the storyline, or creating tons of homework.

I'd argue most people who would watch the series more than likely have done the homework, but even without that Halo isn't especially hard to make accessible. ^note Halo itself drops you right into the middle of a human-extraterrestrial war that's been going on for years with death on both sides, and you leap from a crash-landing to a battle taking place on an alien world that neither species is familiar with, with technology left behind by ancient peoples that will decide the fate of the rest of the universe. Plot's still pretty accessible despite the Expanded Universe that grew around it. Star Wars has been doing this for decades.

If we're talking Mortal Kombat or Uncharted, you can still see all of the nods/references to the games in both of those movies. Those movies succeed for being closer to their namesakes, not further.

Then it's a horrible misconception that just telling people that it's based off a video game, or making it an accurate depiction of a game leads to lack of audience. They may not gravitate toward a story for being "good," but they sure as heck scoff at adaptions for being too different.

Even if I did agree with this, isn't that why everybody on this site checks Rotten Tomatoes and similar places to decide whether or not to watch anything?

Edited by FOFD on Mar 23rd 2022 at 6:55:02 AM

Oh good.

And I meant Arcane in terms of most successful video game adaptation ever.

I watched about 15-20 minutes of the first episode and it was good enough that I've decided to save watching the rest until tonight, so I can watch it with the family.

I find that watching a potentially-mediocre and inferior adaptation of something great is a lot more enjoyable if it's with my older parents who think it's amazing because they either don't know about the original or don't "get" the original's appeal. Lets me focus on the parts that are good and go, "yeah, that's a lot like the original!" which impresses them, lol.

I did the same thing with Cowboy Bebop to great effect; yeah it wasn't exactly a great adaptation but my parents adored it and were extremely disappointed in its cancellation, and that gave me a lot of enjoyment by proxy.

Edited by Dirtyblue929 on Mar 24th 2022 at 11:47:07 AM

Well i enjoyed watching the first episode. A great mix of sci-fi and violence. (Rip rebel people. What horrible ways of dying.)

Of course some fans might be put off with some changes, like the biggest one being we actually see John's face and whose actor i didn't realize until now was the big Leprechaun guy from American Gods.

I'm still gonna watch it even it isn't the Halo adaptation that some diehard fans want.

Edited by MrTerrorist on Mar 24th 2022 at 8:33:31 AM

Much better than I was expecting. Not quite the Expanse but not quite not the Expanse.

Finished watching it with the parents, and yep, they loved it lol. I actually rather enjoyed it myself too; the major divergences so far feel like they "work", though time will tell if they stay that way. Still, I'm cautiously optimistic.

They've added a Human Covenant Prophet to save on CGI I'm sure.

I also think the added emphasis on the Insurrectionists will cut down on CGI too. It will also give more room to focus on how inherently evil the SPARTAN project was without degenerating into Travis-isms.

I'll also note that I feel like the human in the covenant might not be the high-ranking leader everyone seems to be interpreting her as. The conversation she had with Mercy seemed less like him showing deference and more like him treating her like a student that's being groomed and re-educated for a specific purpose.

I'm seeing a situation where they've groomed her to be some kind of public-facing "chosen one" as a convoluted method of deceiving the wider Covenant about humanity's status as The Chosen People of the Forerunners. Time will tell of course.

Edited by Dirtyblue929 on Mar 24th 2022 at 9:37:09 AM

Watched the first episode. I start by saying I've found myself being less obsessed with adaptations being slavishly faithful (as I think fandoms get toxic in large part to possessiveness over what X work "is really about") and more that I am interested in a work putting forth the energy to try something interesting and ambitious.

I generally enjoyed the first episode. There are some things and some changes that don't quite work, but I can say confidentially the first 20 minutes is a fairly solid opening and is willing to give the show an edge by not sanitizing the action too much. Seeing limbs being blown off by plasma weaponry and Elites getting headshotted by snipers really pushed the boundary of the TV-14 rating. The remainder has its good points too but I'm already zoning out on the Miranda Keyes subplot, especially as the order to execute the one survivor who has no sensitive intel feels like a needless Kick the Dog moment for the UNSC leadership, while conversely Master Chief refusing the termination order is not very well explained as it is summed up as "the artifact changed him". That is my main criticism of the episode, though I know people are already annoyed at Chief removing his helmet and so was my roommate.

What I did like was the depiction of the Spartans as a whole was well done. They come across as different in every manner, from combat skills to body language to hyper-focus. Halsey ordering the other Silver team members to support, not arrest, Chief and the way they didn't question her orders is how Spartans should act. Halsey works pretty well, even though being much younger does change the dynamics a bit. The visual design from sets to costumes is fairly slick, it uses the budget well swinging from the small Insurrectionist outpost to the large UNSC military complex with hundreds of soldiers. But this is the first episode, so we'll see how it looks later on.

While it does deviate quite a bit from the storyline and some lore aspects, I generally found it engaging rather than being distracted with "that's not how it's supposed to be." One specific is Spartans apparently had their memories wiped of their childhood to make them more compliant, among many other things that indicate they have failsafes against rogue Spartans. John interacting with the artifact seemed to restore some memories.

Edited by EmeraldSource on Mar 24th 2022 at 9:41:51 AM

I, by contrast, had no problem with the execution order. This is not just the same group that kidnapped a bunch of children and raised them to be super-soldiers, they are THE SAME PEOPLE. Frankly, I thought the girl was suicidal with her statement she planned to disrupt the war effort for her own petty reasons.

Frankly, they SHOULD have just shot her given her actions could get all of humanity killed. Either that or just thrown in a dungeon for the rest of her life.

Halsey's really not that much younger. In the main canon timeline, she would've been exactly 60 in 2552 and her actress is in her 50s.

It's a minor difference at worst, really.

^^ It's actually not the exact same people. We learn about the termination order from a father/daughter conversation, both of whom had little to no say in the Spartan program itself in the original canon. In turn we haven't quite gotten attached to the characters enough to get the sense of dread. given Chief's detatched efficiency, having him disobey orders in the first episode doesn't have the weight that his "No, sir." in Halo 4 did.

^ It's more a matter of portrayal than age as a number. Halsey in the time of the games was being undermined and scapegoated by the new generation, and the white haired senior citizen conveys that idea that she is becoming part of the past. In the show her actress may be in her 50's but is more youthful looking and clearly still vital to the inner workings of the UNSC. It will be interesting if the show explores the different Spartan generations and see how Halsey responds to the III's like she did in the main canon.

I gotta disagree on her "deserving" it or characterizing Kwan as unreasonable and selfish. Well, I mean, actually she is being unreasonable to be fair, but it's a perfectly understandable stance given the circumstances.

She literally just woke up as a prisoner of an oppressive government that murdered her mother for protesting, after watching her entire family and everyone she's ever been friends with get abruptly murdered, with the super-soldiers sent by said government having robotically ignored and abandoned her with the mountain of loved-one corpses after killing the aliens responsible, and the first thing she hears is one of their spokespeople going "hey, if you could maybe go on TV and talk about how great we are and how you regret ever rebelling against us, that'd be awesome." Girl's deep in shock, no wonder she made a suicidal threat instead of complying.

And frankly issuing a kill order against this traumatized teenager immediately instead of like, IDK. Indefinitely detaining her until she's calmed down/worn down enough to be persuaded otherwise (which is still a horrible, authoritarian tactic, but still marginally less unethical) is pretty fucked up, you have to admit. Like it's a little jarring that three of the four tropes in her character entry so far are about how "stupid and ungrateful" she is.

Edited by Dirtyblue929 on Mar 25th 2022 at 9:15:48 AM

Not to mention said lone survivor threatened to blame the UNSC for the massacre for literally no reason.

I mean, like I said, trauma fucks a person up, and these are the people who killed her mother and who her father spent his life fighting for freedom from, coming in out of nowhere right after everyone she's ever known was murdered, throwing her in a cell, and asking her to go on TV and say how they're great and we should stop rebelling. It was boneheaded but it's not something you wouldn't expect from an angry, traumatized, rebellious teenager in that situation.

Edited by Dirtyblue929 on Mar 25th 2022 at 8:57:26 AM

According to Deadline, this series' premiere is apparently doing well for Paramount. However, the numbers are unavailable at the moment, with the site estimating that it did greater than 1883's 4.9 million Nielsen viewers based on Paramount's word.

The series was already renewed for a Season Two, so I guess we'll see from here.

Edited by XMenMutant22 on Mar 25th 2022 at 12:23:47 PM

I understand why she's acting that way but she basically said she'd frame the Spartans for massacring her village and drive away independent worlds that would, as a result, weaken humanity's resistance to genocidal aliens.

If you did this as, "I'm going to frame Britain for the Nazi massacre of my village so that the French don't fight the Axis" then it really isn't something that will do her well.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Mar 25th 2022 at 10:08:25 AM

I mean, she's an Innie. They don't want a united humanity, that's their whole point.

Not really the best metaphor? I mean the Nazis work as a comparable existential threat but the rest kind of falls apart when you think about it and isn't very equivalent to the situation.

Better (but still not perfect) metaphor would be if India was rebelling against the brutal and oppressive British Raj in the middle of a war between Britain and France. French troops come in and slaughter a rebel-occupied village in India for whatever reason, and British troops pull one survivor out of the rubble and immediately ask her to make a public statement calling for India to stop rebelling and help fight France, and she says "I'm going to blame this on you and not France unless you give us the freedom we're fighting for."

Edited by Dirtyblue929 on Mar 26th 2022 at 9:06:35 AM

I feel like there's a lot of blame to go around.

Like, UNSC lady probably should have stopped at we're sorry for your loss and let the girl process what happened before she tried to do a sales pitch. That seems like an incredibly naive move from what I assume to be a diplomat.

But Kwan then saying she'd deliberately lie to the colonies (even considering her understandable emotional distress) is massively short-sighted in light of what she'd seen.

So nobody made the right choice in that situation.

I never actually finished the episode to be honest. I might come back to it later.