TV Show of the Week: Iron Fist

There have been some strong feelings regarding the show. The fans of the previous shows have been split down the middle. They either love it or they hate it, and upon doing some research, I’ve discovered that the majority of those who dislike are critics. I’m not that surprised really. During the weekend I binged watched the entire series to make sure this review was out by today. I have compiled a few thoughts that I have then separated into what’s good about the show, and what’s bad via categories, and I will hopefully put forward a neutral opinion instead of saying whether it’s outright good or bad.

The characters and their development:

What’s good?

They are a representation of what we see in the comics. Danny Rand comes home after having been away for 15 years in the hope of restoring some of his old life back and to find the answers for his parents’ death. We learn that he ran away when he saw the chance in order to find what he’s looking for. To keep the show in line with the previous shows the character is now the protector of his place of training, K’un L’un and is the sworn enemy of the Hand, a supervillain organisation that is the main protagonist of the up-incoming crossover series, The Defenders. The Hand has infected his company, Rand Enterprises and he must find a way to eliminate them for good.

With the show being the fourth in the series, the writers are free to take whoever from those shows and apply them to this or another, and that’s what they’ve done. We get to know more about these side characters along with the main. They offer a sense of familiarity, which does help us understand and learn more about the main characters instead of having to learn a bunch of brand new characters.

It was good to see Claire Temple return. Her down to Earth attitude offers as a subtle fourth wall break to help the audience understand more about the world she’s found herself in. Her introduction to Iron Fist’s world was through an innocent encounter that further established what her mother said back in Luke Cage’s show, that it was her destiny to help those who are gifted with powers. With her story being told over the course of four entire show, I do see her as the most developed character in terms of not being a main character, but because she has made such an impact and has helped many and has come a long way herself, it’s hard to see her as just a side character as well. She sits in the middle and the writers across all the shows have done a good job in telling her story without it being too ridiculous or mundane. It felt as if, during any scene she was in, we suddenly swapped perspectives and saw the world through her eyes.

The Hand also returns as the main antagonist of the show. We learn much more about the organisation than in Daredevil, which is what should happen considering this is the final show before the big crossover event. Madam Gao’s calm, manipulative, and sometimes paranormal appearance allowed her to steal every scene she was in. At first I thought that was a bad thing, considering the main character needs to be bigger than her, but I saw that we need to see just how well established she really is. She’s a powerful adversary who knows exactly what she’s doing, even when things don’t always appear to go the way she expects. Whilst we do learn a fair amount about her in Iron Fist, we still have some big questions we need answering, and hopefully we get what we need in The Defenders.

What’s bad?

The development of the main character himself. Danny Rand’s backstory wasn’t explained as well as I would have liked. We barely see glimpses of what happened during his training, which was a huge part of his life and is the very reason why he’s back in New York city. We do get a few explanations when two characters interact with each other, but it’s still not enough. We do need visuals, and more dialogue, because the last thing that a TV show wants is for me to be forced somewhere else. Whilst it would have been helpful if I had read the comics first, if the previous three shows have showed me anything, that’s I don’t need to have read the comics first. Everything was there, explained well, and made sense.

Sometimes we lingered too long on Rand Enterprises. I found the conflict between Howard and Ward entertaining, because whilst the Hand was a constant enemy, Howard became the final showdown as he held the answers Danny was looking for. However, it felt a little unnecessary to have the Ward and Joy kicked out of the company, only to find their way back in again, only to be kicked out again when Howard returned from the ‘dead’. With the Hand inside Rand Enterprises, it’s necessary to have a bit of conflict, but Ward and Joy being kicked out didn’t seem linked in any way, and if it were, it wasn’t explained as well as it could have been. When they lingered on the company for that unnecessary amount of time, they just didn’t explain what needed to be explained, and they could have swapped out that storyline for helpful information regarding the main plot of the show, Danny Rand’s fight with the Hand.

The fight scenes:

What’s good?

The Hand is a powerful adversary, and with Danny Rand struggling to find his true-self, his skills were affected by that, so when he came face to face with someone who was very skilled, it was an entertaining fight, because I wasn’t sure if Iron Fist would pull through with little injury or not, and sometimes he does get rather badly injured. That counterbalancing kept things fresh as the story went on. With what development we had, as he overcame certain obstacles, his skills grew and soon the enemies who were knocking him to the ground are now being knocked down themselves. By the end of the series, he has reached that stage where, when we see him in the Defenders, alongside Jessica Jones, Daredevil, and Luke Cage, it does show promise.

What’s bad?

Unfortunately, I found a few things wrong with the fight scenes. Iron Fist is one of, if not, the most skilled martial artist in the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe, and I don’t believe they represented that as well as they could have. Some of the fights felt a little rushed, as if the actors needed more time to perfect the moves.

The fight scenes were ultimately dampened by over-editing. Iron Fist is a very skilled fighter, and with all those quick edits in such a short space of time, it was hard to see what was going on. The editing was done in such a way that, it tried to let us see each impact, each reaction, and each counter-reaction, but it would have been so much better if they limited the amount of edits to as little as possible, so we could see the fights as they are supposed to be. They would have been much more entertaining if they did that. There were also a few references to certain film styles along the way – which I have nothing against – but they did do too many references so they were unable to develop their own and therefore offered a unique experience that’s true to the characters of the Hand, Iron Fist, and K’un L’un.

The atmosphere:

Daredevil was dark, gritty and gory. Jessica Jones was dark but with that lust to be light-hearted as Jessica tried to escape the clutches of Kilgrave. Luke Cage’s atmosphere was told through its incredible usage of music – but it, too, was also dark in places. Iron Fist changed the format and went for a more light-hearted tone. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, it can be as light-hearted as Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D if it wanted. It could be even darker than Daredevil with a heck of a lot more gore if it wanted. My main problem, however, was not justifying its atmosphere.

It constantly changed from one to the other between episodes, it was hard to connect with what’s going on. You can justify a scatty atmosphere as long as you’re able to understand why it’s scatty, not just showing us that it is. Iron Fist’s character is struggling with finding his identity, whether it’s as the Iron Fist, or as Danny Rand, that part is clear, but explain to us via a clear message. Each of the shows atmospheres took one aspect and ran with it, whereas this took one aspect used it for an episode, then took another aspect the next episode, then another aspect the very next episode, I had to adapt to a different tone each time, which was properly shown to me.

If it stayed true to one particular aspect throughout, I would’ve been able to slip right back into its world knowing what’s happening – and this is coming from someone who binged watched it. If I hadn’t have watched one episode straight after another, the different tones would have been rather difficult to grasp at first, and it would feel as if I had missed something in between – as if I had missed an episode when I hadn’t.

Overall opinion:

If this was the first series Netflix did, it could be forgiven because it would be a massive learning curve for them, and then the subsequent shows would have gotten better. However, this is the fourth show and they knocked it out of the park the other three times. This really should have been a lot better than what we’ve already gotten.

However, there is one major attribute as to why it didn’t do so well, and that’s time. Netflix and Marvel are on a strict time limit with the Defenders, and so they had to get Iron Fist out before, meaning as quick as possible. They couldn’t spend as much time as they did with the others and it really suffered. The Defenders is scheduled to come out at some point this year. I would be more than happy to wait until next year if it meant a little bit more polishing on this series.

I enjoy this show for what it is, but as soon as you start comparing it to the others, which you will ultimately automatically do anyway, it does start falling down the ranks.

Thanks for reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)