So Paramount+ came out with the first episode of their live action adaption of Halo. It's predictably awful in many respects. The CGI is heavy handed. The plot is uninspired and the writing is equally meh. The Sangheili are two-dimensional.

And yet, the one saving grace is that for some reason, Pablo Schreiber, who plays Master Chief, is weirdly great in the role. I'll watch next week's episode to see if it's worth it.

2/5, will keep watching but barely.

 

Totally agree, Schreiber is the one keeping me around. It's surprising they've recruited him for such a stoic role when he's generally been a comedic actor for most of his career.

Spoiler: Episode 1

I thought they started the whole "Master Chief questioning everything" plotline way too early. They didn't really establish any of the relationships in UNSC command or between the various Spartans on silver team. I would have personally preferred this going rogue bit to happen somewhere around Episode 3 or so.

Entertaining watch, but nothing special. 2/5 for me as well

 

They should have started with Fall of Reach in my opinion. Schreiber is definitely intriguing as Master Chief though so I'm curious. Not sure how far I'll get if the writing doesn't get better.

 

I'm not a huge Halo person but I thought the first episode was entertaining. The CGI needs some work though.

 

Wait, you're telling me that the storyboard of a first person shooter video game isn't exactly the most inspired well-written base material for a TV show?

This TV show will be a monument to all the video game's sins, and I am here for it.

 

Any half-decent writer can write a novelization of a videogame and give it a decent plot. I contend the same should be true for a screenplay. This has not happened.

 

Halo's got all the material you need for a good war story. We've had how many "people are under attack by super advanced aliens!" stories before, in every medium imaginable? Halo's just another one of those, only exceptional because of the gameplay and the combination of both excellence and innovation it brought to the genre. I'm a little baffled why anyone with any degree of artistic sincerity and/or vision would bother trying to make a series (or movie or book or whatever) out of it as a direct result, since so much of the series' strengths are tied up in it being a video game, but it shouldn't be hard to make an at least decent narrative out of what's presented in the games.

On a lighter note, I saw this and felt compelled to share:

 

The first Halo game had a decent horror twist midway through that would have made for good TV. The Forward Unto Dawn miniseries was decent on its own, at least in the aspect of how the Covenant was introduced. I never played Halo 3: ODST, but it was significantly more character focused than the main campaign from my understanding.

It wouldn't be hard to make a decent series out of the material that's there. They just don't seem to have done so.

 

I really pablo schreiber, so after feeling meh for the bigger part, i was very pleasantly surprised. Also the artsy wife from Californication playing the mad doctor was interesting.

wait, what? I know him from the wire, 13 hours, american gods and one heist movie whose name i don’t remember. Where was he comedic actor?

 

I was ready to drop this show after episode 2, but I gave it one last shot with episode 3 and I am very pleasantly surprised. With the introduction of Cortana as a character, and with John fully exploring his humanity, this show is actually worth watching now.

Edit: Except for this stupid Asian rebel girl. I don't give a shit about her storyline.