Monday, October 9, 2017

On The Air: The Gifted (2017)

Marvel Comics' TV arm has joined forces with 20th Century Fox to develop a new mutant-centric series for Fox, and like FX's Legion, The Gifted is a series that intends to spotlight some lesser known X-Men, as well as a few that long time fans are familiar with.

Curiously, while there is no familial link established between district attorney Reed Strucker (Stephen Moyer) and comics villain Baron Strucker, the one common link is that each has two children with mutant powers. While the Baron's kids were identical twins, known as Fenris in the books, Reed's teenage offspring, Andy & Lauren are just manifesting their powers as the series begins. What develops is that the Strucker family has to go underground with a group of mutants led by Thunderbird.

The following trailer was presented at Comic-Con in San Diego:



I waited a few days before watching this On Demand, and, well, color me unimpressed. While I get a vibe that says they're using The Fugitive as a partial template----and that template worked pretty well for The Incredible Hulk 40 years ago---using the same humans vs. mutants for all the wrong reasons tack that was used in the first X-Men trilogy of movies in a short-season series might not be the wisest direction to take. Marvel TV is in a bit of a slump right now, after their last two Netflix entries, Iron Fist & The Defenders, were savaged by critics. We'll take a look at Marvel's other network frosh, Inhumans, another time.

Rating: B--.

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