I’ve heard both good things and bad things about the Secret Invasion storyline in the comics. To be honest, though, I'm not sure if it's suited for this particular medium; it’s an event spanning many characters and many books, and is poorly suited to a six-episode adaptation. But I suppose it doesn't matter, because they still did it, and while I definitely feel there was real effort put into this (aside from the AI made intro but I digress), it's not enough to just try hard; at some point, you have to deliver. The thing is, I feel a lot of elements of this show work on paper or in theory, but when put into practice, are much more flawed.
Written as a sort of sci-fi/political thriller, the focus is on the Skrulls trying to start a world war between the nations of the world, with hopes that humanity would wipe itself (in the comic, their goal is to ultimately weaken and destabilize Earth enough for a full scale invasion, but with what the MCU has established about the Skrulls, I don't think that would've worked her). At any rate, while you'd think this would be a sort of "who do you trust" based story, the series ultimately turns away from that concept, revealing a lot of people to have been Skrulls in a remarkably unremarkable way. Some of it is downright confusing, with characters we know being revealed as Skrulls; the notion of Rhodey having been a Skrull since the events of Civil War in particular is such an Audience-Alienating Premise that I feel Marvel didn’t so much shoot itself in the foot with it as much as it hacked off its foot, threw it into the air, and shot it (if the MCU executives had any sense, they’d ditch that concept the moment it was suggested). On that note, the Skrull antagonists aren’t as sympathetic as they should be, with Gravik’s motivation boiling down to another standard “humans suck” spiel, and their sufferance at the hands of the Kree is ultimately more told than shown.
The Super Skrull concept is good in concept as well, but it’s approached the wrong way. The comics were savvy enough to limit the powers of a given Super Skrull to just a few heroes at the time, not all of them at once, as the series ultimately depicts. Now, obviously they can’t do the Fantastic Four’s powers in this, but what they do ended up doing for the first half was honestly effective enough; but instead of just running with that concept they decide to quadruple down. Not helped is the fact that the CGI in this is stunningly bad, possibly the worst I’ve seen in a Marvel product. I don’t know if it was a budget thing, a time thing, or both, but when it shows up, it’s really obvious, and really hurts, especially in a climax that's so over the top, CGI filled, and silly, it's hard to take seriously.
With all that said, I do think there’s some good in this series though. Honestly, some of the best scenes are just two characters sitting and talking with each other, and I do think this is some of the best acting I’ve seen from Sam Jackson in an MCU product. There were a lot of times where I was completely invested in the show, simply because of the performances. Emilia Clarke is also clearing trying really hard, and apparently had a really good time making the show, so who are we to fault her for that? Even Kingsley Ben-Adir delivers a solid performance for the most part, even if Gravik isn’t written especially intriguing. To be frank, that's probably the best way to put the acting; most of the writing might be pretty subpar, but the actors are clearly trying nonetheless.
Do I think it’s 13% bad? Well, I don’t know about others, but I’ve seen WAY worse products than this with higher scores on RT, and there are a few individual good things in this series. At any rate, it’s safe to say that this was one of Marvel’s bigger misfires, and if Disney wants to keep this franchise going (because why wouldn’t they?), they’d better get Fiege and the others to step up their game, and soon. I suspect if The Marvels fails, with everything else going on, that might be a loss the MCU may not be able to recover from.
Series They tried, but trying isn't enough
I’ve heard both good things and bad things about the Secret Invasion storyline in the comics. To be honest, though, I'm not sure if it's suited for this particular medium; it’s an event spanning many characters and many books, and is poorly suited to a six-episode adaptation. But I suppose it doesn't matter, because they still did it, and while I definitely feel there was real effort put into this (aside from the AI made intro but I digress), it's not enough to just try hard; at some point, you have to deliver. The thing is, I feel a lot of elements of this show work on paper or in theory, but when put into practice, are much more flawed.
Written as a sort of sci-fi/political thriller, the focus is on the Skrulls trying to start a world war between the nations of the world, with hopes that humanity would wipe itself (in the comic, their goal is to ultimately weaken and destabilize Earth enough for a full scale invasion, but with what the MCU has established about the Skrulls, I don't think that would've worked her). At any rate, while you'd think this would be a sort of "who do you trust" based story, the series ultimately turns away from that concept, revealing a lot of people to have been Skrulls in a remarkably unremarkable way. Some of it is downright confusing, with characters we know being revealed as Skrulls; the notion of Rhodey having been a Skrull since the events of Civil War in particular is such an Audience-Alienating Premise that I feel Marvel didn’t so much shoot itself in the foot with it as much as it hacked off its foot, threw it into the air, and shot it (if the MCU executives had any sense, they’d ditch that concept the moment it was suggested). On that note, the Skrull antagonists aren’t as sympathetic as they should be, with Gravik’s motivation boiling down to another standard “humans suck” spiel, and their sufferance at the hands of the Kree is ultimately more told than shown.
The Super Skrull concept is good in concept as well, but it’s approached the wrong way. The comics were savvy enough to limit the powers of a given Super Skrull to just a few heroes at the time, not all of them at once, as the series ultimately depicts. Now, obviously they can’t do the Fantastic Four’s powers in this, but what they do ended up doing for the first half was honestly effective enough; but instead of just running with that concept they decide to quadruple down. Not helped is the fact that the CGI in this is stunningly bad, possibly the worst I’ve seen in a Marvel product. I don’t know if it was a budget thing, a time thing, or both, but when it shows up, it’s really obvious, and really hurts, especially in a climax that's so over the top, CGI filled, and silly, it's hard to take seriously.
With all that said, I do think there’s some good in this series though. Honestly, some of the best scenes are just two characters sitting and talking with each other, and I do think this is some of the best acting I’ve seen from Sam Jackson in an MCU product. There were a lot of times where I was completely invested in the show, simply because of the performances. Emilia Clarke is also clearing trying really hard, and apparently had a really good time making the show, so who are we to fault her for that? Even Kingsley Ben-Adir delivers a solid performance for the most part, even if Gravik isn’t written especially intriguing. To be frank, that's probably the best way to put the acting; most of the writing might be pretty subpar, but the actors are clearly trying nonetheless.
Do I think it’s 13% bad? Well, I don’t know about others, but I’ve seen WAY worse products than this with higher scores on RT, and there are a few individual good things in this series. At any rate, it’s safe to say that this was one of Marvel’s bigger misfires, and if Disney wants to keep this franchise going (because why wouldn’t they?), they’d better get Fiege and the others to step up their game, and soon. I suspect if The Marvels fails, with everything else going on, that might be a loss the MCU may not be able to recover from.