Halo Episode 1 (Spoilers) (Fan Creations)

by ZackDark , Not behind you. NO! Don't look., Friday, March 25, 2022, 04:39 (973 days ago) @ Cody Miller

A group of insurrectionists on a mining planet finish talking about how much the UNSC sucks, and how badass spartans are. Their mine is attacked by covenant elites, and it's a massacre. Rows of machine gun turrets are ineffective as the bullets merely bounce off the shields, and nobody can harm the elites. Suddenly a group of spartans shows up. The Master Chief rips off one of the gun turrets, fires, and suddenly the bullets are now splattering enemy brains despite being ineffective minutes before. They fight exactly the same way the insurrectionists fight. Same types of weapons. Similar tactics. And somehow now they wipe the floor with the Elites.

The same literal machine gun was an unforgivable stretch, but one could rationale their brought-on weapons have a much bigger punch than AK-47s. Also, I'm almost positive the show runners wanted the naïve audience to consider the Elites were Spartans up until they breach the wall.

If you have not played any Halo game before, you will be confused and not like this. If you have played only the games, you might like it but will still be confused. If you've read a few books and played the games, then you can follow what's happening. 343 still just refuses to allow Halo media to stand on its own. Nothing makes sense unless you know from Fall of reach that Halsey kidnaps kids and wipes their memories to turn them into Spartans. If you don't know this… nothing will make any sense at all because this is not established despite being a major thing to know to decipher character motivations.

In short, the MC touches a covenant artifact and sees… his childhood. But he doesn't know that yet. Meanwhile the UNSC flips out and wants to kill him, because they presumably don't want him to remember. But unless you've read the book… you have no idea why his childhood memories are so dangerous. And so none of the actions will make sense.

You expect every show to tell you the entirety of everyone's motivation up front every time? I think ever since Lost no big show has ever done it.

One Insurrectionist (a kid) survives, and the Spartans, cold as ice, leave her as they fuck off. Later the MC is ordered to kill her and he decides… not to? The turn is seemingly out of nowhere. There was no doubt in his decision to leave her to die before. They don't have much of a report (they speak briefly about him killing her mom however)… and yet he risks everything to keep her alive and go AWOL.

I mean, he did have those flashbacks in between, so, you know, that's the point. (Pet peeve: rapport)

Her:"Why are you doing this?
MC: "I don't know".

If YOU don't know… how should WE?! This feels like an episode 4 or 5 turn… after we establish character histories and they have time to interact. Everything happens so rapidly.

Refer to the Lost point.

The standout scene is when Quan talks to Miranda Keyes via hologram and totally shuts her down and makes her look like a fool. Olive Grey played it great, with a big fat smirk on her face thinking she had the upper hand, until she was told off. This is the type of complexity and conflict I think we could see more of later on (hopefully).

Agreed.

They show itself… well it manages to feel both cheap and high end at the same time.

Also agreed. So weird.

I don't think it's unredeemable… and it might not be fair to judge a whole show by one episode, but I think the rest will have to improve a lot and do some heavy lifting. The show is actually about something. They just need to bring that out.

I liked it a lot, but I can see major potential to suck. Hoping for the best!