Wow, this season ran off the rails. I was
meh on the first season, but, while I loved the Punisher stuff (until his storyline's pathetic denouement), I agree with
The AV Club's reviewer that the last few eps were
hot garbage.
The Hand and its ninja have managed, in their two seasons, to be even more generic, boring, and ill-defined than
Arrow's League of Assassins. And to tease this "Black Sky" for two seasons, and then declare that Elektra is it somehow, with no explanation whatsoever as to what makes it/her so powerful... that's just shit storytelling. Who was the blood feeding?! And that massive hole in the gound - I don't mind the show teasing future storylines here and there. But to end an episode treating the hole as a massive discovery/cliffhanger and then to completely forget about it for four whole episodes is
garbage.
Ben Urich, Detective Clemons, ADA Reyes - three Netflix/Marvel seasons, three prominent characters of color killed off for cheap shock/plot advancement. Lame at
best.
I'm assuming Elektra is enhanced, because in no way do I buy that a prepubescent girl can throw grown, muscled men around and kick them hard enough to knock them off their feet. Trained or not, her body weight and muscle mass just isn't there. And Matt, who can hear Foggy through several hospital floors, can't hear the body movements of the ninja, but
can hear them exhale? Who got paid to write
that crap?! And then there was that shocking scene were the Hand cut the lights to the sewers or whatever, so Matt/Elektra lost them... Matt is
blind, for Christ's sake!! (Did I mention the part where a very mild bit of steam lets the ninja,
carrying the stumbling blood patients, get away from him? Well, I just did.) And Foggy lugging an unconscious Matt to his apartment in broad daylight with "no one noticing", in Manhattan?! When that shot of his apartment building roof in the finale shows the street outside fairly heavily trafficked
at night?
What?!
The writing in the last few eps, including much of the dialogue, was
terrible. Karen's "New Yorkers are heroes, because we live in Hell's Kitchen" piece was puke-worthy. Hell's Kitchen is a
small neighborhood in
one borough, lady! Does your paper only target one minor Manhattan neighborhood?! And why does the same
one police sergeant turn up at every crime scene, even when (as in the Punisher graveyard scene) Manhattan is in the
distance? And isn't sergeant a fairly low police rank, yet here he is, ordering all these other cops around like he runs the show? How stupid do the writers think we are? (Hint: they think we are
very stupid. As in, "willing to buy observers
carrying large signs being let
into a courtroom stupid.") Also, Foggy, a guy in his late 20s/early 30s, gets offered a corner office with an assistant because he gave a strong opening statement?
The season's climax on the roof sucked
hard. No police helicopters, no spotlights, no cops despite there being tons of cops on the ground. A few incredibly lame, emotion-free brawls. Punisher set up for mowing down tons of ninja with all that weaponry, and he shoots two or three after getting to the scene late. No emotional weight
anywhere, with Elektra's death being yawn-worthy.
Arrow's Season 3 finale was far better than that.
Yes, D'Onofrio remains an impressive ham. All the actors are good, though Yung's range seems limited (but she does have the worst dialogue by far). No hint whatsoever as to why The Hand is so fixated on NYC as opposed to any other city in the world. Risible writing, beyond-lazy plotting, and each ninja fight was more tedious than the last, and they weren't much to begin with. (The biker gang fight alone was far better than
every Hand appearance from
both seasons
put together.)
... This is a
very mediocre show, inane teenage stuff compared to
Jessica Jones. And the fact that S2's showrunners are running
The Defenders is a very bad sign. I'm curious to see more of Bernthal's Punisher, but I'd be quite happy not to see any more
Daredevil itself. At least
Arrow, which I've given up on, knows to have charismatic villains like Barrowman and McDonough around. The big hole in that building has more personality than the entirety of The Hand, plus Madame Gao and her lackeys.
Lame, guys. Just
lame. :dodgy: