The Shannara Chronicles Season 1 Episode #01/02 – Chosen Review

What was once a fairy tale is about the consume the world in fire and fury.

What They Say:
Chosen – When Four Lands is in danger, the fate of the world rests on the shoulders of an unlikely trio.

The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
MTV has done some really neat things over the last couple of years with its original programming and it didn’t surprise me to see them dip stronger into the genre pool after the successes of Teen Wolf. With the void there theatrically when it comes to fantasy style material now that all the Lord of the Rings films have finished out, and nothing of note on cable, The Shannara Chronicles can certainly carve out a great position for itself. It’s put together a really solid cast, looks to be working with great talent behind the camera, and is adapting a very well respected novel series. I never read them myself because at the time I was big into the Weis & Hickman fantasy works of Dragonlance and the Darksword material. Oh, for a Rose of the Prophet adaptation.

So, with a ten episode run that’s looking to tell a story with the time in which to do it, I get to mostly go in with a blank slate here and that’s definitely very appealing.

As with many series of this nature, the catalyst for events is change itself as we’re introduced to Amberle, an elven princess who has just become one of the seven Chosen for succeeding in completing a very difficult race. She’s the first young woman to do so, though that’s mostly because of tradition as opposed to a hard and fast rule. Amberle is certainly more chosen than other Chosen as she hears the voice of the Ellcrys tree that helps to guide her in some ways to complete it. The Order of the Chosen are the ones that protect the tree and what it represents, going back thousands of years when the elves fought the demons and imprisoned them by turning to magic and placing them in the Forbidding. The king, surprised by rolling with Amberle’s being part of the Chosen, talks about how it’s likely just folklore for some of them, but we know that there are tales of truth within it as this is our far-flung future, a world where things have fallen and risen in a new way. And Amberle gets a taste of that when she touches the Ellcrys.

With her as protector, we’re introduced to Wil, a young elf who has just lost his mother to illness. But before she passed on, she gave him a pouch with Elfstones, something that his father believed were powerful and important even as others thought him crazy. In the traditional mold, certainly owing to the series origins in the novels, Wil now finds himself ready to move on into the world as she instructed him with her dying breath to find the Druid – who himself has just woken up in an icy tomb some great distance away. The clues are there for Wil to be sure, especially when his uncle panics upon seeing the Elfstones, so you know there’s a richer history to that and to his own father’s past considering the way Flick responds to seeing them.

While a lot of shows go for very big openings and a lot of splashy moments to really get their hooks into you, Shannara really does move slowly here in the first half hour. It covers a lot of ground in introducing us to things and the “young adult” side of it works in its favor with the overall direction. Particularly with Amberle up until she communes with the Ellcrys and sees a dark future where she’s seemingly killed others, including her current boyfriend of Lorin. The show is easing us into this world rather than thrusting us into it and I really like this more laid back approach as it gets underway. In particular, I find myself really like Amberle and how Poppy Drayton has a good sense of innocence, eagerness, and then fear over what she senses is happening and tries to process it.

While Amberle’s journey initially is more inner and spiritual in a sense, Wil’s is all about the world at large. Leaving Shady Vale, a place he’s never traveled very far from before, has him coming face to face with the harsh realities of what’s out there – made worse by being a half-elf. This means trolls and the like, which he has no experience with and is only saved by the arrival of Eretria, a young woman who certainly has fun playing with him. Giving will a more experienced guide of sorts out there in the world helps to ease our own journey into understanding it as Eretria provides the context that we need. It also gives us a little taste of the whole mysterious ancient past with humans and how many of those that live today pretty much aren’t interested in any of it since it has no impact on their lives today. While these elements were a lot more subdued in the books from what I can tell, talked about more in later volumes, it’s not something that you can avoid when doing it up visually in a series like this. And I’m glad because it’s the kind of visual hook that I love.

One of my truly favorite pieces here, however, is Manu Bennett as Allanon, the last Druid of Paranor. With him having been lost for thirty years and not having aged at all when he arrives in the king’s court, it’s a great meeting of old friends who understand each other and the younger set who don’t believe who he is or what he is – not that Allanon will perform his magic tricks upon demand. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed Bennett’s performances from when I first saw him in Spartacus and then on Arrow as well as his time in the Hobbit movies, so seeing him going against type here to a large degree by playing a Warrior-Druid works exceedingly well for me. He brings something different to the table just in his appearance and demeanor, especially among all the younger actors in the lead here.

The show sets up the quest side of things easily enough here, to do what’s necessary to save the Ellcrys so that it doesn’t cause the end of everything by allowing the demons to be freed from its imprisonment. With the slower pace to work through the various coming together elements while also having one demon freed and beginning its own path here, it’s able to give it all some good room to breathe so that it doesn’t feel rushed in what’s trying to do. With so many pilot/opening episodes being little more than proof of concept pieces, this series avoids that like a few others have by getting a straight to series ten episode order. So it works its pacing differently and combining the first two episodes into one night reinforces that, especially since they went very minimal with commercials in the first hour. The end result is definitely a good one in my mind as we see the reveals and layers peeled back bit by bit rather than in a furious rush.

In Summary:
I’ve read some complaints from other reviews with what they don’t like about the show, some of it colored by the books to be sure as well as applying an MTV-filter view to it, but I finished off this nearly two-hour event really enjoying what it brings to the table here. The production values are fantastic, it has a good theatrical feeling and flow about it with the direction and cinematography itself, and it doesn’t play coy or silly with the fantasy elements here. So many fantasy shows for so long have been like the silly syndication shows, but this one embraces what it is and, considering its origins, is a solid companion style project for Lord of the Rings fans. This gives me a whole other world to inhabit and I’m excited to see where it all goes based on this.

Grade: A-

Chris Beveridge

http://www.fandompost.com

Chris has been writing about anime, manga, movies and comics for well on twenty years now. He began AnimeOnDVD.com back in 1998 and has covered nearly every anime release that’s come out in the US ever since.

He likes to write a lot, as you can see.

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