Halo

Schreiber has always conveyed vulnerability under his stoic, strong exterior. He takes what could have been a bland character and makes him interesting enough that viewers will stay engaged to see what he does next.

Halo’s first two episodes (available for review) are exciting and captivating, though they differ greatly between one another in tone, and there’s no way to tell from watching 22% of the season whether they stick the landing. What I can say is that it is more ambitious in scope than I expected, but in becoming so it veers away from the original games.

Where this all goes and whether the balance tips more toward character and story or more toward video game-like battle scenes is unclear, but if the first two episodes are any indication, character stories will win out. As long as that remains the case, I’ll gladly go along for this sci-fi ride.

There are good parts to Halo, and scenes and characters that should interest to new and old fans. But at least in its first two episodes, there is also room to grow. Halo has the potential to be the big-budget, hugely-watched space epic it wants to be. It just needs to take a breath and focus on its story — instead of its backstory — to do that.

Halo commits the sin of reminding the viewer of a similar, better show [The Mandalorian.] ... But ultimately, what pushes Halo from being mediocre to good is its action.

It mostly succeeds in this regard, with the relationship between Quan and John proving to be the show’s saving grace. They offer a hopeful glimpse at a future where they both help each face off against a universe that is dead set on using them for their own means. Even when everything else around them struggles to come together, they remain the glue that holds it all together.

Hail to the Chief? Not quite, but despite some uneven plotting, this is a worthy adaptation that promises better things to come.

The obvious parallels are with The Mandalorian, another show about a seemingly invincible, murderous space warrior who embarks on a path towards becoming a total sweetie. If that’s the long-term plan here, neither the show nor Schreiber has quite nailed it yet.

The series’s cinematography, like its narrative priorities, is uneven. ... How Halo is choosing to spend its time, though — that strange artifact, an endless war, and political backstabbing — isn’t yet as compelling as whatever weirdness could be happening in the forgotten corners of this universe.

The first couple of episodes represent a decent start that, despite its best efforts, failed to stun me. But it didn't drive me away, either. Without question, one detail the producers got right is casting Pablo Schreiber ("American Gods," "Orange Is the New Black") as Master Chief. The man has range, and that makes the possibility of what he could bring to "Halo" exciting.

Seeing the world through a vacant perspective might work for a game in which the audience has its own agency, but not for a show that requires its own point of view. In its first two episodes, “Halo” doesn’t quite have that yet. But as another entrant in the ever expanding “Halo” universe, it at least has enough ambition to make it worth a closer look.

Schreiber and Ha have good hero-sidekick chemistry, and there’s an element of dedicated sci-fi weirdness that keeps things from feeling too rote. (Bokeem Woodbine, for instance, is having a lot of fun in a second-episode role as literally the only person John knows who is not a government-altered killing machine.) But the whole thing is brought down by the writing—which never goes for a second-draft line when a first-draft line will do—and by an abiding and pervasive sense of cheapness.

While “Halo” features a few minor pivots in these early hours, there’s very little to spoil and even less to spark curiosity that’s not already present. Perhaps most surprising is how smoothly the initial narrative plays out, given how many creatives came and went during development.

Yet the main problem with "Halo" is that if you're at all familiar with the movies mentioned above and their ilk, it actually feels like bits and pieces of everything you've ever seen, just wrapped up in shiny new armor.

“Halo” may be a perfectly competent action story in space, but it feels like a lesser version of things that have come before, including its own source material.

Maybe Halo does play as more exciting and specific if you have an internal checklist of game elements — weapon types, helpful acquisitions, character or planetary allusions — you’re looking to have acknowledged. For those of us who don’t necessarily crave or appreciate those things, Halo has a generic story, limitedly engaging characters and a clearly high special-effects budget that yields respectable but unremarkable results.

The story variously tilts toward canonical completionists and confounded newbies, with dialogue variously impenetrable and explanatory.

Unfortunately, based on just these two episodes, it may be a bumpy ride, as this adaptation already has significant problems—coming across as nothing more than a generic assemblage of science-fiction stories, disappointing action sequences, and uninteresting characters.