Anyone who has watched Game of Thrones and enjoys it will know the standard that it keeps to, being produced by HBO. When the first 'Beowulf:Return to the Shieldlands'episode began you had the title sequence, what's that music I hear?... yes it sounds a bit like the Game of Thrones main theme! What interesting visuals in this cg Title sequence, reminds me of something... oh yes it's sort of like..... Game of Thrones!...
So straight off the people behind this are basically saying 'This is our attempt at Game of Thrones, and we're so lazy that we're not even going to try and come up with our own unique style of title sequence' - EMBARRASSING!
The first shot has some weird things running on a beach, but they're not really running, they look like weird ape things with horns that have been poorly rigged by a 3D artist who was rushed for time. So they sort of limp in an odd way along the beach. OK so the people behind this series didn't seem to put all the money into vfx then! SO where has the money gone? Costumes, set design? Maybe some well known great actors?
Keep watching the episode and you'll see lots of leather costumes, overly designed, mostly dark in colour, just lots of leather everywhere. Somehow the costumes although looking like time was spent on them, look unconvincing and dull, not very cool or stylish, just a bit 'meh'
The more you watch the only familiar face I saw was William Hurt, oh but he's (spoiler!) already dead a third of the way into the episode, oh it's OK we have some flashbacks that use him. But oh well guess he wont be seen again after this episode. Anymore good actors? Nope. the rest of the series we're stuck with this Kieran Bew guy. Kieran Bew is Beowulf.. apparently. To me he looks more like a bloke you'd see in a greasy spoon, enjoying his fried eggs with bacon and baked beans before going about his day on a building site. Either that or he'd be selling mobile phones. This is Beowulf..... BEOWULF! He does not look cool, I don't look at him and think, yeah this guy can fight monsters, hell yeah!.... No he's just an average looking bloke who you'd see down the pub. The rest of the cast seem to be black people or white people with stupid hair styles. Now I have no problem with black people being in Beowulf, there could have been a few around at that period, fair enough. I'm happy to see the blacksmith is a woman who knows how to use a sword. Considering the period and location though I really have to say they went a bit too far with the casting, by the end of episode 2 I'm left with the impression that there are a lot of black people living in Scandinavia, for some reason. I'm all for equality but I think this is too much.
And then I have to move onto production design. Exteriors are fine but not overly memorable. Interiors? Oh dear! The main hall, well basically the production designer seems to love gold and swirls, as that's all you see, EVERYWHERE its GOLD and SWIRLS? Is there any design to it? No it's just messy and all over the place. Money has been thrown into this set, but no thought has. So it ends up looking awful, cheap and tacky!
So what about the overall story from the first 2 episodes? Well in the 1st episode we saw Grendel, and Grendel had feelings for this woman who's like a poor mans Anne Hathaway. SO instead of going around ripping people apart Grendel has feelings now, it's a 21st century Grendel. The 2nd episode is about some shape shifting guy, how does this relate to Beowulf? It doesn't, they may as well have just made up a new hero with a different name, completely different universe etc why bother calling it Beowulf?? Because the people in charge of the project were creatively sterile. The people calling the shots on this production have completely missed the reasons why Game of Thrones works. Everything HBO produces is pretty much film quality, from the cinematography to the costumes and sets. Game of Thrones killed off its biggest actor at the END of series 1. NOT the first episode! You have to give audiences reasons to stay hooked! You need good writing and acting. You need good sets and locations. Beowulf is incredibly lacking in every department, the biggest mistake for me is the casting coupled with the poor writing that takes a great historical legend and turns it into Hollyoaks level Television.
So straight off the people behind this are basically saying 'This is our attempt at Game of Thrones, and we're so lazy that we're not even going to try and come up with our own unique style of title sequence' - EMBARRASSING!
The first shot has some weird things running on a beach, but they're not really running, they look like weird ape things with horns that have been poorly rigged by a 3D artist who was rushed for time. So they sort of limp in an odd way along the beach. OK so the people behind this series didn't seem to put all the money into vfx then! SO where has the money gone? Costumes, set design? Maybe some well known great actors?
Keep watching the episode and you'll see lots of leather costumes, overly designed, mostly dark in colour, just lots of leather everywhere. Somehow the costumes although looking like time was spent on them, look unconvincing and dull, not very cool or stylish, just a bit 'meh'
The more you watch the only familiar face I saw was William Hurt, oh but he's (spoiler!) already dead a third of the way into the episode, oh it's OK we have some flashbacks that use him. But oh well guess he wont be seen again after this episode. Anymore good actors? Nope. the rest of the series we're stuck with this Kieran Bew guy. Kieran Bew is Beowulf.. apparently. To me he looks more like a bloke you'd see in a greasy spoon, enjoying his fried eggs with bacon and baked beans before going about his day on a building site. Either that or he'd be selling mobile phones. This is Beowulf..... BEOWULF! He does not look cool, I don't look at him and think, yeah this guy can fight monsters, hell yeah!.... No he's just an average looking bloke who you'd see down the pub. The rest of the cast seem to be black people or white people with stupid hair styles. Now I have no problem with black people being in Beowulf, there could have been a few around at that period, fair enough. I'm happy to see the blacksmith is a woman who knows how to use a sword. Considering the period and location though I really have to say they went a bit too far with the casting, by the end of episode 2 I'm left with the impression that there are a lot of black people living in Scandinavia, for some reason. I'm all for equality but I think this is too much.
And then I have to move onto production design. Exteriors are fine but not overly memorable. Interiors? Oh dear! The main hall, well basically the production designer seems to love gold and swirls, as that's all you see, EVERYWHERE its GOLD and SWIRLS? Is there any design to it? No it's just messy and all over the place. Money has been thrown into this set, but no thought has. So it ends up looking awful, cheap and tacky!
So what about the overall story from the first 2 episodes? Well in the 1st episode we saw Grendel, and Grendel had feelings for this woman who's like a poor mans Anne Hathaway. SO instead of going around ripping people apart Grendel has feelings now, it's a 21st century Grendel. The 2nd episode is about some shape shifting guy, how does this relate to Beowulf? It doesn't, they may as well have just made up a new hero with a different name, completely different universe etc why bother calling it Beowulf?? Because the people in charge of the project were creatively sterile. The people calling the shots on this production have completely missed the reasons why Game of Thrones works. Everything HBO produces is pretty much film quality, from the cinematography to the costumes and sets. Game of Thrones killed off its biggest actor at the END of series 1. NOT the first episode! You have to give audiences reasons to stay hooked! You need good writing and acting. You need good sets and locations. Beowulf is incredibly lacking in every department, the biggest mistake for me is the casting coupled with the poor writing that takes a great historical legend and turns it into Hollyoaks level Television.