Halo Episode 1 (Spoilers) (Fan Creations)

by Cody Miller , Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Thursday, March 24, 2022, 16:19 (756 days ago)
edited by Cody Miller, Thursday, March 24, 2022, 16:46

Let's establish the scene:

A group of insurrectionists on a mining planet finish talking about how much the UNSC sucks, and how badass spartans are. Their mine is attacked by covenant elites, and it's a massacre. Rows of machine gun turrets are ineffective as the bullets merely bounce off the shields, and nobody can harm the elites. Suddenly a group of spartans shows up. The Master Chief rips off one of the gun turrets, fires, and suddenly the bullets are now splattering enemy brains despite being ineffective minutes before. They fight exactly the same way the insurrectionists fight. Same types of weapons. Similar tactics. And somehow now they wipe the floor with the Elites.

The emotion and logic here is just totally wrong… if the Spartans are indeed badass, their victory needs to be earned through what they do differently. It makes no sense that only the Spartan pistols make the Elite's heads explode, while the other's do nothing.

Why don't the Spartans show up and find their own guns ineffective too? Oh shit… now we have tension. As everyone is picked off, chance could have a stray plasma pistol overcharge drop the shields of a random Elite. The spartans can then gang up on one Elite, overpower it, and steal its weapon. Turn that weapon against the rest, and slowly turning the tide by arming others. They should use superior tactics or training unavailable to the insurrectionists. They should do things only they are strong enough to do to set traps or evade death.

The video game logic of it makes sense: Spartans show up and clean up. But the film logic does not.

If you have not played any Halo game before, you will be confused and not like this. If you have played only the games, you might like it but will still be confused. If you've read a few books and played the games, then you can follow what's happening. 343 still just refuses to allow Halo media to stand on its own. Nothing makes sense unless you know from Fall of reach that Halsey kidnaps kids and wipes their memories to turn them into Spartans. If you don't know this… nothing will make any sense at all because this is not established despite being a major thing to know to decipher character motivations.

In short, the MC touches a covenant artifact and sees… his childhood. But he doesn't know that yet. Meanwhile the UNSC flips out and wants to kill him, because they presumably don't want him to remember. But unless you've read the book… you have no idea why his childhood memories are so dangerous. And so none of the actions will make sense.

One Insurrectionist (a kid) survives, and the Spartans, cold as ice, leave her as they fuck off. Later the MC is ordered to kill her and he decides… not to? The turn is seemingly out of nowhere. There was no doubt in his decision to leave her to die before. They don't have much of a report (they speak briefly about him killing her mom however)… and yet he risks everything to keep her alive and go AWOL.

Her:"Why are you doing this?
MC: "I don't know".

If YOU don't know… how should WE?! This feels like an episode 4 or 5 turn… after we establish character histories and they have time to interact. Everything happens so rapidly.

The standout scene is when Quan talks to Miranda Keyes via hologram and totally shuts her down and makes her look like a fool. Olive Grey played it great, with a big fat smirk on her face thinking she had the upper hand, until she was told off. This is the type of complexity and conflict I think we could see more of later on (hopefully).

They show itself… well it manages to feel both cheap and high end at the same time. Not something I'd hold against it if it were engaging.

I don't think it's unredeemable… and it might not be fair to judge a whole show by one episode, but I think the rest will have to improve a lot and do some heavy lifting. The show is actually about something. They just need to bring that out.