Reviews

Well it looks like Marvel butchered yet another well established character. I've read Namor and watched the early cartoon versions of him for decades. Every iteration of his portrayal were consistent throughout the years... until the MCU's version came out. Much like DC's Ocean Master, he was a haughty self absorbed egoist with a high-nobility way of speech to go along with it. This MCU version is basically as introverted, boring, and quiet as possible. When he threatened to kill a person or destroy the world, he said it with the gusto of reading the dictionary. The infamous "Imperius Rex" got replaced with some gibberish I will not bother to learn. Sure the action scenes were all good but that's on the CGI team, not the actor himself. The Atlanteans as a whole got nerfed to hell in this universe, much like the Black Order was in Infinity Wars. The Black Order in the comics were each world destroyers. Proxima Midnight's spear had the weight of a sun that she could lift and throw it at will. They slew armies of Thors like nothing in Battleworld. Yet Black Widow, a normal human, blocked her strikes without becoming a pile of fleshy goo during the Wakanda battle. The same kind of nerf was applied to the Atlanteans in this movie. Even average joe Atlanteans can lift 4 tons because they live in the crushing depths of the oceans. Atlantean warriors are 10 tonners, basically as strong as an elephant. Attuma is an established 60 tonner yet Okoye, yet another normal human, blocked his strikes in fights, without an Iron Woman suit. So I guess either Okoye can block the charge of 6 elephants as well, or Attuma got nerfed to hell in this movie. I'm not even going to touch on how Namor, a 200,000 tonner got beat by Shuri's version of BP. Even weakened, he's as strong as Attuma in the comics and should be able to slap Shuri silly with ease. If DC can portray their Atlanteans accurately, why can't Marvel? DC's average Atlanteans can run through walls and destroy boulders with a punch. Marvel's Atlanteans gets flung and beat by humans. On the Wakanda storyline side, it was ok. The strongest acting came from Angela Bassett. Once she was gone, the acting became Disney Kids shows level.

This show doesn't hold a candle to the original trilogies. Sure the cinematography, costumes, visual effects etc. Are top notch but the storyline is weak and the characters are weak. The most compelling part for me in 4 episodes was when Galadriel almost drowned. BTW, that was such a stupid thing she did, who the hell wrote this? There's really is no sense of danger or urgency even when Galadriel keeps telling us that Sauron's coming and the sky will be falling. I felt little for each new character introduced. They mostly seem half baked and lack personality. It's weird that a guy who died 100 years ago can breathe more life into characters than a dozen modern writers. The pacing can be agonizing sometimes. I guess it could be because this is a series and they need plenty of filler times. Some scenes are pretty unbelievable. Like a certain female elf overpowering 4 guards bare handed AND shoving them into an enclosure? That does not fit into Tolkien lore at all! Men are physically stronger than elves. There's no way a 120 lb woman can shove 4 grown men in armor, or 800+lbs so easily. No matter how much more fighting experience she has, she did not have any mystical powers at this point to augment her strength. But ok we just have to accept she's as strong as a super hero for no reason and she has the power to swim across an ocean and fling grown men around easily.