Into the Badlands

I can't help but feel a certain scruffy affection for a show in which the hero is learning to read by perusing Paradise Lost and where the political economy is summed up in a single line of dialogue: "Power is not inherited...It's taken." Take that, Frank Capra.

Dramatically inert, Badlands is at least technically accomplished.

Into the Badlands is a perfectly average television show.

How I wish the rest of Into the Badlands rose to the occasion of the phenomenal choreography. The story lines and the characters aren’t disastrous, by any means, but they’re disappointing as they fall into the action, post-apocalyptic, and family-soap formulas we’ve seen many, many times before.

Into the Badlands should be nonstop, melodramatic entertainment. But the first two episodes are listless and dull whenever Wu isn't battling villains. The writing lacks flavor, and the performances are stiff, with the florid exception of Csokas' Quinn.

The new AMC show is packed with rigorously choreographed and slicingly edited action scenes, and it builds a mythology that combines elements of Asian martial-arts movies, American Westerns, film noir, horror, biker flicks, and nighttime soap operas.... One big problem with Badlands is its punishingly dour tone, utterly devoid of humor or any fleeting moments of lightness.... I just wish Into The Badlands was more fun.

Doing more than two or three big fight scenes per hour is a practical impossibility in television. So even though the swordplay is fun, there's not nearly enough.

Beneath the veneer is nothing but cliches loosely stitched together. Actor Daniel Wu, however, does what he can. [13 Nov 2015, p.57]

Though loosely based on the 16th century Chinese tale Journey To The West, Into The Badlands has no interest in folding in its folk mythology into the series that would distinguish it from an overcrowded television landscape. Instead, it adopts a cheap comic-book visual and narrative style that makes it just one in a crowd.

For all the agility on display in Into the Badlands, the series feels narratively uncertain, stuck between the simple pleasures of genre staples and the sadly unfulfilled aspiration toward a more imaginative, substantive work of stylized fantasy.

It’s a little “Mad Max,” a little “Mortal Kombat,” a little “Gone with the Wind,” a lot head-scratchingly dumb.

For all of the impressive whirling, gouging and slashing acrobatics on display in Badlands, the action often feels strangely inert. Whether badass male or kickass female, these combatants tend to be joyless, expressionless ciphers. [23 Nov - 6 Dec 2015, p.14]

The problem is that at no point during the first couple of episodes does the show truly come alive as a drama about actual people inhabiting a convincing fictional space. It doesn't pulse with life, as any series defined mainly through its actions ought to. And when action does happen, it's disappointingly personality-free.

Sure, it's all very derivative. It's purposely so. That's not the problem with these scripts. The problem is that, despite all the blood, too many anemic characters fail to register on the flesh-and-blood scale.

In its overall sweep and style, Into the Badlands struggles to find a bigger idea or compelling narrative that could really draw a crowd and keep it entertained.

The dialogue is so clichéd that it calls attention to itself. And that wouldn’t be such a problem if the plotting could overcome the clichés, but it’s thematically shallow too. Through all of this, Daniel Wu does his best to ground Into the Badlands. He’s an engaging lead, and seems eager to be given more to do in terms of character than look concerned and kick ass.

The characters themselves are mostly one-dimensional, and the performances range from stiff to dull. The only exception is Marton Csokas, whose hammy turn as the evil, Southern-accented baron who employs Sonny is a highlight.