Halo (TV Series)

Wait, isn't The Chief dead and his body piloted by Cortana now?

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I do find Chief and Cortana's dynamic interesting.

• Chief is a man made into a cyborg and stuffed inside a suit of armor. Stoic, uncompromising, and sometimes barely human as the entire point of his design.
• Cortana is a machine made in the image of a woman, stuffed inside a suit of armor. Logical, cold, but prone to emotional outbreaks due to flaws in her design.

Chief loves Cortana in a sense (see Halo 4's ending) and will compromise himself and his standing to protect her, but obviously struggles to demonstrate this physically (ie - getting choked up whenever Cortana brings up her rampancy).

Cortana loves Chief but shows that by not putting him in jeopardy, and she struggles because she can't physically interact with Chief despite wanting to (again, Halo 4's ending).

I don't know how much that means to the ace community but I do find that relationship interesting. It's one of those depictions of love you don't see in fiction a lot.

So, making John have a sexual relationship with someone is kind of a disservice to the character no matter how you slice it.

They were never gonna stick with the "John is braindead" thing.

No doubt it'll be a convenient way for them to explain changes in how he's written.

I’ve been thinking about it a bit, and I think people need to kind of get more on board with the idea of an adaptation being a remix rather than a direct retelling being okay.

I’m not saying the Halo TV show is a golden standard of that, but it takes notes from good sources (I’ve consistently described it as trying to be a B- Expanse) and fiddles with the source material in ways that creates new opportunities and new character arcs. Makee’s a little iffy as an addition, but I think adding in Kai was a great move. Because John was rediscovering his humanity as he was manipulated to hell and back by everyone around him, but Kai basically did her journey entirely on her own volition.

And I have to be honest, I really prefer show Miranda over game Miranda. I like the idea of her being the best parts of both of her parents and her making a huge breakthrough because she just talks to the Spartans like they’re people and pays attention to what they’re saying. She’s obviously going to be tested in season 2, but having a character with an actual functional moral compass helps a lot. The games have an issue where the UNSC has much less standards than they pretend they do, but Miranda tempers them in a way that doesn’t remove their flaws as a whole.

They were very clear about that in marketing at least. That this was never meant to be a straight adaptation and more of a reinterpretation.

But that's not gonna stop people from reading that Schreiber didnt play the games and then coming to the insane conclusion that he, and by extension the rest of the project, doesnt care about the material at all.

I can think of a lot of remix adaptations that get a weird reaction because people don't know what to do with them.

People got mad at Scott Pilgrim Takes Off for veering wildly away from the comic and the Netflix Ultraman anime got a lot of shit for barely even trying to match the rest of the franchise. They're both terrible adaptations/extensions if you assume adaptation means "1:1 fidelity or as close as possible".

But part of the thing about adaptations is that new people get involved in the process and I like being able to see people put their own creative stamp on things. Sometimes it can be a complete dud, but sometimes, it can do something incredible. Like, I love the Expanse TV show. It changes a lot from the books. One of the most prominent characters in the show (Camina Drummer) is only really in one book, but she's present through the entire run of the show and she adds so much to it.

I don't think the Halo show is perfect or anything, it has some pretty distinct missteps, but like...it's interesting, and in a good way. It sets up things ahead of time. In the game timeline, we barely see Reach or the Rubble before they're destroyed. Hell, the Rubble never gets seen directly in anything, it's just mentioned as a holdout against the UNSC that got destroyed. Taking time to visit it and show us what it actually was is a great idea.

And, yeah, the sheer number of changes is something to debate about and no one has to like the show, but it's a success because it's actually pretty good on its own merits and it's setting up enough stuff that the audience that hasn't played the game isn't going "I don't know what this is" every 10 minutes.

It spends the first season establishing a status quo so the audience actually has an attachment when everything starts going to hell. The games didn't need that so much, but...Reach in the games falling isn't really that emotional a concept because Reach falling is one of the earliest established things in the backstory. It's hard to care that much when you start with "oh yeah, it was glassed ages ago."

Edited by Zendervai on Dec 8th 2023 at 10:47:26 AM

I have similar feelings about Chief taking off his helmet. Never seeing his face is a meta gag about the games being first-person shooters. In-universe, he takes it off all the time and all his acquaintances know what he looks like. Without it being a plot point like in The Mandalorian, making the actor always have to wear a helmet is kinda crappy, and I'm glad they ditched the gag.

...though it didn't particularly help that The Mandalorian proved it was entirely possible to act through a helmet. Not that it needed proving considering bunch of half-century-old kids' shows could pull it off, mind.

Edited by Chortleous on Dec 8th 2023 at 10:34:10 AM

It's possible to act through a helmet, but it's kind of difficult, and it's actively counterproductive to a story about someone rediscovering their lost humanity.

It's also actively silly to be like "but Master Chief never takes his helmet off in the games!" as a complaint because as mentioned, he takes it off all the time in the expanded universe. It's more canonically accurate that he only wears it when he has to. the people whining about it are the real fake fans

I think what my position boils down to is basically like...it's okay to not like the show because it's not a 1:1 adaptation, but since it never pretended to be and isn't trying to be, that ship has sailed and the show should mostly be discussed either on its own merits or how it does use the shared elements. Not just "it's not the same so it sucks". Like...Kwan Ha being kind of unpleasant is a legitimate complaint. "Halsey is different, I liked the original" is not. It's okay to not like the depiction of Halsey, but you need to build on that and not just go "it's different so it sucks".

Edited by Zendervai on Dec 8th 2023 at 11:40:16 AM

My personal issue with it was less him taking the helmet off per se and more that they very obviously didn't want to 'ugly up' their lead actor. He's... pretty consistently described and shown as being super pale and ragged-looking, iirc?

Edited by Chortleous on Dec 8th 2023 at 10:53:25 AM

He's described as like, borderline albino. Which is a bit wonky in general and, I have to be honest, would require the other Spartans to all be like that too, which starts getting into a weird place that is probably best avoided.

If Makee and the Spartans all have a sort of borderline albino thing going on, you get this weird "albino means you're augmented in some way" thing.

However, I do think that's a legitimate issue someone can have, because it's an actual thing that's not just "it's different and I don't like it". It does make sense for the Spartans to be really pale because they basically don't spend any time outside without the armour. And, thinking about it, they are all generally pale with the exception being the black guy. (Makee being pale also makes sense because it's not like High Charity is swimming in sunlight and her home planet was in bad atmospheric shape too)

Edited by Zendervai on Dec 8th 2023 at 12:00:10 PM

I think it helps that, while Schrieber is a handsome man, nobody really treats John the character as handsome.

Which is pretty typical for this sort of thing, really. The other Spartans, who are also all attractive, are the same way.

Edited by ArthurEld on Dec 8th 2023 at 9:57:20 AM

If a work is borrowing the name and associated popularity of another work to sell itself though, harsh comparison to the original should be expected. I don't think the audience needs to be inherently more receptive.

Sonic The Hedgehog faced all the scrutiny in the world but managed to capture the original in a fun way. Halo on the other hand got a lot more criticism. The aforementioned John having sex with another Spartan and being brain dead. Nobody who played Halo wanted to see John have sex with a Spartan and it feels like a misread of the character rather than an .⁸

There is a line between creative and excessive. For every The Dark Knight Trilogy or Arcane that takes the titular characters in notoriously different directions, there's an Assassin's Creed or a Street Fighter Legend of Chun Li that deserve all the hate they get for not being closer to the source material.

Edited by FOFD on Dec 8th 2023 at 1:35:23 PM

John didnt have sex with a Spartan.

And he's been braindead for maybe 30 seconds of screen time.

And the showrunners stated very early on it's a completely different continuity.

That's not "harsh criticism", that's complaining about shows you dont watch.

And that's strawmanning the first part of what I said and disregarding the rest.

I mean, it's clear you haven't watched the show.

I don't really have any interest in debating the merits of the show when you cant be bothered to get your facts straight.

The braindead thing is a "wait to see what they actually do with it" thing, because judging a story by its cliffhangers is a great way to misunderstand it.

John did have sex with Makee which was...not a great choice (I get and actually like the idea, that being that John and Makee are the first people they've formed that kind of emotional connection with for each of them, but the execution is real wonky) but it's less "why the hell did they do it" and more "oh, this was intended for Showtime originally, okay, it could be much worse".

The thing is though, that the braindead thing is literally the season finale cliffhanger (so intended to shock the audience and make them want to come back for season 2) and the sex scene is a single scene late in the season. There is criticism to be made about the sex scene and why it's there, but it drowned out the whole rest of the discussion really badly.

Edited by Zendervai on Dec 8th 2023 at 1:47:49 PM

And not even just the sex scene but also even the mildest nudity.

Like, I realize Americans have deep puritanical roots, but the amount of people freaking out over the Spartans' nudity when removing their chips was ridiculous.

That was visual storytelling 101 (the characters are naked to reflect their symbolic rebirth) but too many people went "oh my god a naked butt! What is this show?!?!"

The show is actually kind of unusual in how it handles nudity. We get full back nudity for John, a couple times even, but Makee is never really shown below the neck and Kai is shown in a really restrained way too. But we also get full back nudity (and barely obscured frontal nudity) for Vishner Grath. The show is a lot more willing to show male nudity than female. And I mean like, even premium cable stuff tends to reverse it, where it's much rarer to get that much male nudity than female.

It's actually pretty fascinating and I think it might be worth looking into it more, that sort of thing.

Edited by Zendervai on Dec 8th 2023 at 1:55:28 PM

I think that's because even for the men, while more skin was shown it was still non sexual.

I feel you can show more of a mans body than a womans and keep it non sexual.

The thing is that Halo has maintained a largely internally consistent canon up to this point, while numerous other properties have had dozens of alternate versions so people are more open to different takes on the material. Any adaptation would have to make changes to fit a cinematic structure over an interactive one, and making it an explicit alternate continuity can get ahead of some things.

In truth, the Halo TV show is much closer of an adaptation than the majority of comic book movies. Those films take broad ideas but have original narratives, while using an easter egg or two as an in joke for fans. Halo makes some changes but weaves material from the entire expanded universe into the core narrative. On the one hand in the books the Spartans were ambivalent to the immorality of the Spartan program because that's all they know, on the other hand the show gives them an opportunity to discover their own identity rather than just a weapon for the UNSC.

And it's really obvious why they made that specific change.

When you have a series of games where Master Chief doesn't really care about his history, going "yeah, the Spartans don't care" in the expanded stories makes sense. It avoids a weird narrative dissonance where the Spartans focus on this thing except when a player is controlling them. Especially since the Halo games aren't particularly interested in giving Master Chief complex arcs. Hell, the first game barely has a plot, it's more of a premise.

In a show, you need your main characters to get actual character arcs and you need to give the actors something to do. The Spartan backstory is horrific, and since the main canon has that story element it keeps introducing but doesn't want to engage with about "how far is too far when it comes to protecting humanity", pulling that element to the front and engaging the characters in it is such an obvious move that it's basically screenwriting 101. Not only that, we have five different character arcs that interact with that history in different ways. John, Kai, Miranda, Halsey and Keyes all have arcs relating to it and how they interact with it and they all behave differently.

That's good TV writing. In a game, especially one like Halo where, to be frank, the plot isn't the focus of the experience, you don't need all these characters to get clear arcs, especially when some of them barely get any screentime.

A lot of the changes are because a show has different needs from a game and those are unavoidable.

The show also fixes one of the really, really big flaws of the original canon. Which is that the game canon really doesn't like interrogating the morality of things that occur before the main events of the story. The UNSC destroys the Rubble? It's a footnote, no one cares. The Covenant wipe out most of the Insurrectionists? Well, they're invariably monsters in flashbacks, so that's fine. The UNSC is justified because it knows the Covenant is coming...but the Spartan program predates that, and they spend decades lying to all of the human worlds about what's going on while getting more and more controlling and more and more resource hungry.

The show is like "wow, that's fucked up, maybe the Insurrectionists wouldn't have been such a big deal if the UNSC wasn't trying to create a shadow empire without ever explaining why? And maybe they could have, at least, vetted the people they put in charge of the outlying colonies?" and the game canon is like "the UNSC was justified because it meant they were ready to fight despite not knowing about the threat when they put everything into motion and the Innies suck anyway." That's kinda gross.

When you don't have gameplay to fall back on, interrogating the messed up assumptions that the original story refused to address is smart, it's a great way to build tension and to get people invested.

Edited by Zendervai on Dec 8th 2023 at 2:23:13 PM

I think that's why all the other Spartans we see are original characters.

EU Spartans get a lot of personality. They're not an army of faceless, voiceless grunts, and adapting one of them directly may have been more trouble than just writing new Spartans.

Uh, I do want to be clear, I think the show has some pretty significant flaws and it's not anywhere near a masterpiece.

I think almost every decision they made was a smart one, it's just executed with varying levels of competence. The Kwan Ha plot is great in theory because it creates a human viewpoint from outside the UNSC, but the execution results in the character being deeply unlikeable and I don't think that was intentional.

It's a flawed show, but it's not a disaster or a betrayal.

Like, I said, it's B- Expanse. It does the fundamentals well enough that it gets a reasonably good grade, but it has significant room to improve.

Edited by Zendervai on Dec 8th 2023 at 2:29:09 PM

I mean there's more to it than that. John is more talkative than he is in the games, there's no Sgt Johnson a character from the first game, we have a woman indoctrinated into the Covenant, John being on Earth alongside Silver Team when he was by himself in the first Halo. It's not just the sex scene. The brain dead scene, or rather, the scene of Cortana piloting John's body sticks out because that scene is probably the most remniscent of what the Halo games are actually like.

And whether any of those are acceptable changes due to it being a different continuity is heavily YMMV.

It is technically closer than most comic book movies, but, and putting aside the feelings of purists who dislike the revisions of Thanos/Loki/Iron Man/Ant Man because nobody pays attention to that vocal minority, its far easier to change those settings and characters with good feedback than it is Halo's, as evidenced.

I don't know what this is referring to. Earth never shows up in season 1, they're on Reach for a lot of the show. And in the first game, yeah, he was on his own for most of it, but...that was on the Halo and the show hasn't even reached Fall of Reach yet (which it looks like season 2 will). The first game only establishes that he was the only Spartan on the Pillar of Autumn, which doesn't mean very much.

Season 1 of the show mostly takes place in this kinda blank spot the game canon doesn't really care much about. We don't actually know if Game Canon John was in a team or not at this point because it's not considered an interesting part of the timeline.

Edited by Zendervai on Dec 8th 2023 at 2:53:46 PM