Likes:
- My Butterfly Princess from Enter The Badlands is in it
Dislikes:
- The anachronism of significant numbers of people of color in England during that time period becomes ghastly when only one person of color has a speaking line.
The initial director is Indian and did The Bandit Queen and Cate Blanchett's Elizabeth from the 90s. That is the only way I can explain the Indian best friend who always looks like he is on the verge of saying something but never does except a single line just before his white friend is humiliated by a woman for having a small penis.
No, I am not kidding.
Every other person of color is set dressing, not even truly an extra. Open doors, appear prominently in the background, the darker the better, but never in groups -- and never in Marlowes gay orgies.
- The exclusion of token ass of color in Marlowes' scenes when every other scene has token people of color is mind-boggling, and suspect.
- There are plenty of older (white) men with speaking lines, primary and secondary characters, but no older women.
Contrast this to the number of very young (and very white) women who not only have speaking lines but are portrayed as equals to the men.
- Colm Meaney's daughter disrespecting him a couple scenes after she is shown co-writing one of his most famous plays would have meant something if there were consequences for disrespecting an elder -- but there are no consequences, the whole thing is forgotten.
- The lines of the play do not mesh with how the characters deliver their other lines. There is no authenticity of delivery, there is no soul. As it is, it's hard to believe the people in this show's world show up to these plays, let alone make them rousing successes. How do the play's relate to them? There is none.
The show feels like High School Musical, the Elizabethan years.
- The costuming looks cheap and inauthentic.
- The religious struggle seems tacked on, not an organic issue permeating these people's daily lives. And that's with the graphic torture scene. The torture scene didn't feel like something every character had to fear in the back of their minds in this world.
- Marlowe was a spy in real life. Less gay white twink orgies, more spy intrigue shyt.
- My Butterfly Princess from Enter The Badlands is in it. ( If she's in this in a major role, what does that mean for ETB - which in my opinion is a much superior show in every way?)
The show feels like it should be on the CW.
Claws is trashier, and has it's own significant race and sex issues. I'd still rather watch Claws.
My disappointment in an Indian director pulling this crap is tempered by the knowledge that Indians are supremely racist and he probably uses people of color the way he does as a fukk you for being forced to include them. The lack of older women when the main character was historically married to a woman much much older than him is icing.
Grade: D.
