The Nevers

That the many characters and interwoven stories didn’t become confusing was a triumph, and the moments where touched “turns” were displayed were subtle enough not to distract from the main narrative. Skilful, too, were the understated social messages that still ring as true today as they did in the Victorian era – women with unchecked power are a threat to the status quo and abnormality is to be feared.

Fetchingly original Victorian dark fantasy. [26 Apr - 9 May 2021, p.7]

True’s penchant for fisticuffs, reminiscent of the leads of every past Whedon show, ensures action aplenty as “The Nevers” develops characters alongside an engrossing, deepening mythology.

It’s a historical drama awash in lush costuming and production design. It’s a sci-fi epic unraveling the mysteries of the universe. It’s a screwball comedy and Harlequin romance starring quick-witted heroines, surly detectives and devastatingly handsome heirs. Even when it errs towards the silly, it’s fun and twisty enough to be an engaging page-turner of a show that should grow its own fanbase without much trouble.

Even when the multiple plot strands curl this way and that, and if it’s a bit difficult to keep track of all the players without a scorecard, “The Nevers” is a dazzling visual feast with gorgeous sets and first-rate CGI, sly humor, ambitious and sometimes deeply moving set pieces and wonderful performances from the ensemble cast.

At the end of this run sent for press, it feels like it’s finally finding its voice, ironing out some of the early tonal imbalance and allowing its most interesting characters to shine, some thanks to a few very unexpected plot turns in episodes three and four.

If you can keep track of who’s who and what’s what amid the confusion and the corsets, there’s a lot of fun in the adventures of these extraordinary women.

The enthusiasm comes at the expense of developing any of the characters beyond their immediate impact. The dynamic between the two leads is promising. Despite their advantages, they must still put up with being young women in a male-dominated world. But the relationship is hardly given space to breathe amid all the plotting and exposition.

There’s a genuinely intriguing anchor in their [Penance Adair & Amalia True's] friendship, and in True’s grappling with her intrusive past. Whether or not The Nevers cares to favor its characters over immensity in its later episodes remain to be seen, but I imagine viewers’ patience with the Whedon-verse, and The Nevers’ bloat, will be thin.

Whedon's name understandably may not generate a lot of good will these days and the unevenness of these early episodes -- which alternate between clever, exciting passages and overstuffed, drearily paced stretches -- might not inspire the kind of instant following of his past work, but there's a lot here that works and, in the right hands, might keep working for many seasons to come.

For every beat that strikes the right tone, there’s at least one that’s laughably over-the-top or utterly indecipherable. ... But I’d be lying if I said I’m done with “The Nevers.” Whether it’s the allure of watching a trainwreck in motion or that the intermittent flourishes add up to just enough entertainment, I’ll at least catch the final two episodes of Part 1. I can’t say never to “The Nevers,” even if I have no idea what it means.

The Nevers stumbles even more awkwardly as it juggles overt social themes with flat-out silly plot developments. ... The Nevers gets better when it embraces its wild side. ... Right now, it's all steam and no punk.

Setting aside the backstage drama involving series creator Joss Whedon, The Nevers begins with an intriguing premise and develops it in such a plodding way that interest progressively fades with each successive hour. The idea of an X-Men-like group in turn-of-the-19th-century London surely has potential, but The Nevers needs to get better, sooner rather than later.

Asking audiences to patiently stay with any series in creative crisis flux is a lot these days considering the ample alternate options out there. Usually, the potential has to be extremely present and The Nevers might just be too messy to fix.

Whedon is adept at utilizing the large casts of his shows and movies and making sure the stories he writes services all of them. In The Nevers, he succeeds in some respects but other parts of this show need some work. ... It feels like Whedon has set up a very complex story for himself, one that we’re not sure he’ll have the time to explore the way it should be explored.

When I finished watching, there were no characters I felt drawn to, or provoked by. I took in all the excess and atmosphere, all the flippant banter and brutal fighting, and I was left untouched.

The Nevers still feels like a Joss Whedon show, for good and for ill, with most of the downside that comes from his work and only occasional glimmers of what made him beloved before he became toxic.

The Nevers is a show in desperate need of focus, and as episodes progress, more and more characters are added and the connection to the richest thematic throughline becomes increasingly tenuous.

Even if you’re not a Buffy buff, there’s enough retread here to give déjà vu to viewers of Whedon’s other series. ... Perhaps the show’s premium cable berth ultimately will allow the show to flower in a way different from that of Whedon’s other series, all of which aired on broadcast networks. Sadly, though, the most noticeable indicator so far of The Nevers‘ more permissive network standards are the proliferation of boobs for boobs’ sake.

There's nothing wrong with wanting "The Nevers" to be a unique vision, and disappointing to realize it gives us very little we haven't seen before.

As it is, the key features feel so mired in the interests and legacy of its original creator that it’s hard to imagine what that future could even look like. If these first episodes were better made, the fact that Whedon’s name leaves a fishy smell on the whole show would be more of a shame. Today, though, The Nevers is an unimpressive monument to a storyteller whose work has meant a lot to many people, but who cannot now figure out how to rise to the moment.

Expensive, confusing mediocrity. ... There might have been a way to salvage such an unwieldy plot, so that a show whose dialogue, production values and acting (especially Donnelly’s lead performance) are above average for Dickenscore could at least hold viewers’ attention, the way the even-sillier Irregulars does. But the incomprehensibility of storytelling that barely allows time for us to register a character’s existence before moving on to a new set of faces, ensures that The Nevers is rarely fun.

“The Nevers,” while handsomely produced and, from moment to moment, reasonably diverting, doesn’t catch fire in those early episodes in part because we — along with the characters — are still trying to figure out what the heck is going on. ... That need for the show to resonate with our present priorities ties into the frustrating vagueness, so far, of the storytelling. ... None of this might matter if there were characters that we really cared about and performances that drew us in, but “The Nevers” is also lacking in those departments.

“The Nevers” should have devoted itself to that misandrist idea rather than this hybrid of “X-Men,” “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” and “The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen,” which four hours in feels like a copy of a copy of a copy.

The Nevers joins His Dark Materials and Lovecraft Country as recent HBO endeavors in the genre space that feel like rushed properties, stuffed with good ideas but underbaked in execution. There's something a little too silly about The Nevers at present. Simply put, we not seeing Whedon at his best, and it's difficult to imagine how the show will resolve into something coherent when its creator has stepped away.

Beyond trite monologues about oppression and belonging, it remains unclear how each of the Touched relate to their powers, or their place in the world more broadly. ... The Nevers heaps layer upon layer of unnecessary plot atop its tidy premise. ... The Nevers’ dizzying character roster does its performers a disservice as well.