The Defenders: The Defenders

 "It's just a city, They rise. They fall..."

Hmm. I mean, there's nothing wrong with this. It's finale stuff. It does the job. It wraps things up. It's exciting. But... is it me who's feeling perhaps a little underwhelmed?

So Luke, Jessicaand map go down into the bowels of our metaphorical Hell beneath New York. They blow the baddies up. Matt stays behind to try and persuade Elektra to turn good... but she's a baddie precisely because she wants to be with him forever in deatyh and, as she says, "This is what living feels like." It's all very dramatic, but also a bit cliched.

There's so much weight placed on the police captain wanting our heroes arrested, too... but then, at the end, all charges are dropped, no questions asked, part of the cover-up. Oh, there are a few good character moments, I suppose, although not that good. Misty losing her arm is a genuine shock. I have no idea about these nuns who have in some way rescued Matt. But, well, this is a bit of a let down after some good recent episodes.

I'm going to continue blogging all of the formerly Netflix Marvel stuff, fear not. But there's less of a mad rush now, as Daredevil: Born Again won't be rushing upon us on Disney Plusas soon as we thought. Besides, despite Jon Bernthal's impressive performances, I'm not a great fan of the Punisher as a character, and next up is thirteen episodes of him. So I'll be taking a short break and watching a certain animated series in this "slot".Fear not, though. It will be just a short break.

The Defenders: Fish in the Jailhouse

 "Karen, this is my life."

Structurally, this is your typical penultimate episode, maneouvvring everybofy into position for the finale. Matt, Luke and Jessica begin in the police station with tough questiins to anseerr, but by the end they're ar the lair of the Hand, fighting its three remaining fingers. Meanwhile, Elektra tries to persiuade Danny to side with her, abandoning his prior allegiances as she abandoned hers.

But the heart of this episode is about character. It's about trust,and integrity. The integrity of Luke, who puts his city and its millions of people above the risk to his hard-won liberty. The trust placed in him and his friends by Misty, risking her entire career. And the trust of Foggy in Matt, smuggling in his Daredevil suit. The Hand and Elektra are divided, broken. But our gandg are, in the end, united. Even when it comes to Colleen's explosive plan.

Some of these relationships are fascinating. The deep mutual respect between Misty and Luke, and Misty's equally respectful understanding with Claire, perhaps the wisest character. The slow journey undertaken by Karen and Foggy to understand that Matt is Daredevil, and denying that is pointless.

It's all nicely done, and the characterisation is good. The episode is, perhaps, necessarily formulaic, and seeing protagonists in unfair legal trouble is never fun, meaning this episode isn't quite as entertaining as the last couple. But we seem set fair for a finale worth waiting for. Let's hope it lives up to its promise.

The Defenders: Take Shelter

 "You are the dumbest Iron Fist yet!"

This is a fascinating episode. The heroes are not yet fully a team, not least because Matt is hiding the truth about Elektra from them... but it's great to see them interact. But the greater friction is, of course, within the five fingers of the Hand. This is a particularly strong episode. All the pieces are out and the mid-game phase is underway.

Plot-wise, things are pretty simple. The heroes' loved ones are threatened by the Hand, so Misty is persuaded to give them protection. Elektra is the catalyst to everything. Matt is forced to confess her backstory, and insists that some part of the resurrected "Black Sky" remains Elektra- something which the ending seems to prove. Meanwhile, the baddies turn against Alexandra for her going off-piste in resurrecting Elektra. Oh, and Stick beheads Sowande, as you do.

There is so much lore being hinted at. Does Gao blind her acolytes, and does this explain Stick's origins? There are hints that there may be more to K'un Lun than is known to Danny. The Hand has "always" owned New York. Alexandra had a daughter before her pilgrimage to K'un Lun.

Deeper than this, though, is the characterisation. Karen and Stick are pulling Matt in opposite directions. Claire is utterly devoted to Luke, and a wise friend to Colleen. This is very well written and acted. It's nuanced, fascinating television, balancing the action with intrigue and solid characterisation. I'm impressed. The Defenders has been good from the start, but this is more.

The Defenders: Worst Behaviour

 "The Black Sky! We have it!"

The opening is thrilling. After Alexandra once again hints she may be older than she looks- did she know Istanbul when it was Constantinople and if so under a sultan or a basilius?- we get an incredible sequence in which a vaguely amnesiac Elektra is resurrected, trained, and used by the Hand. Wow.

What follows is equally awesome, as our four heroes follow their different leads to follow Midland Circle and all meet up fighting the rather combat-proficient board of said company... but not without some great character moments along the way. The early meeting between Luke and Danny is priceless. Luke's scepticism about the dragoins and mystic monks is a nice little meta touch, reminding us they're not quite from the same genre. But Luke's reminding Danny of his privilege packs a puch. As does the poor old lady's reaction to the news that Cole, her last surviving son, is dead.

Then their's Stick, escaping from Alexandra like the cool customer he is, casually mentioning a "lifetime of serving "K'un Lun": he's a proper dark horse, he is. And Jessica's private eyeing, finding out about Midland Circle by pretending to be some eccentric tech sis(?), and of course wondering what that suspiciously fleet of foot blind lawyer is up to.

But now, at last, they've all met! I'm loving this, and I can't wait to see what will happen next. But I'll have to, because I'm struggling to keep up with Loki and Gen V...

The Defenders: Mean Right Hook

 "We just go and find another team to join? An army?"

Oh boy. This is quite the episode. Our heroes are all investigating what seems to be a big, multifaceted conspiracy involving the hands from different directions, in what seems to be a well-constructed plot. There's so much going on, but the story is easy to follow, not an easy combination. I'm enjoying this very much.

Sigourney Weaver's dying Alexandra continues to fascinate, and not only because she can order around Madame Gao like an underling. Is she hinting, after her private performance by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, that she may be considerably older than she looks? Is this why Jessica traces the shell companies back to 1820 and finds it doesn't stop there?

I like the handling of the characters. Jessica is her irrepressible, irreverent self. Luke may be all loved up with Claire, but nothing will stop him doing the right thing. Matt, complete with an intervention by Foggy to give him work to be "another type of hero", is struggling with not being Darevevil: heroism as addiction. Danny is a right mardyarse: I fail to see what Colleen sees in him. Oh, and Misty is awesome.

At the end, excitingly, our protagonists meet. There's a hero vs. hero fight between Luke and Danny, in which we get to see what happens when the unstoppable force that is the Iron Fist meets the immovable object which is Luke. And Jessica's attorney is... Matt.

I can't wait to see what happens next.

The Defenders: The H Word

 "People call me Foggy."

"And you let them?"

It's so good to see so many of these characters for the first time in ages. Danny and Collen I've only just seen, of course, and Darevevil was in She-Hulk, but I've missed the others.

As a first episode, of course, this just establishes where the characters are and develops them a bit. So Luke is freed from prison due to the sterling work of Foggy... and finally gets a room with Claire. About bloody time. Jessica is... drinking lots of bourbon, until she's drawn into a case by sheer stubbornness. Matt lis laying off the old vigilianteeism and realising he's in love with Karen, and the love triangle stuff with Elektra was unwise, despite his real feelings for her. Danny and Collen are back in New York in search of the Hand... the only possible Big Bad.

We meet an intriguing new character played by Sigourney Weaver who is told, in her very first scene, that she hasn't long to live; a fascinating writing choice. And we then find out that Madame Gao, no less, takes orders from her. That's quite a surprise.

For now it's slow, with the heroes not yet meeting. But that's fine; lots of characters to share screen time and be developed. So far I'm very much enjoying this.

Iron Fist: Dragon Plays with Fire

 "It was someone much more treacherous than I..."

And so the season ends, at last. And the finale is, in the end, superb. What could have been a tiresome tale of false accusations turns out to be much deeper.

This is about Harold, the arch-manipulator, who always was the malevolent puppet master. I suppose we didn't need Gao to tell us it was Harold who arranged for the plane to crash, not wanting Danny's father to expose what was always his heroin operation. I'm sure I wasn't the only viewer who had more than an inkling.

But it's about more than that. It's about Ward redeeming himself, being loyal to Danny and enen showing some wise self-knowledge at the end. It's about Joy realising the terrible truth about her father, yet being perhaps easy prey for Davos trying to turn her against Danny as Gao smiles. It's about bad, abusive families and the damage they cause across the generations, some treatable, some bad. Colleen and Danny are a sweet couple but, as Claire says, they're both pretty damaged people.

I saw thend coming, too: K'un Lun is gone for the next fifteen years now. Yet Danny has learned a lot about himself, and what he wants to do as an Iron Fist: to be a hero. It's fitting that he and Ward are reconciled. Both of them have grown.

Yes, this series was uneven in places. But overall the final episodes are strong enough to make it a very impressive serial.

Iron Fist: Bar the Big Boss

 "I know a good family therapist that could help... should any of you survive the night."

This is an excellent season finale, wrapping everything up, or at least wrapping enough things up. Yet there's an episode to go after the surprise cliffhanger. It'll be interesting to see where this is going.

The episode is all about family relationships.We see Ward for the first time in a while, offered freedom from the, er, psych ward by Bakuto and the Hand, causing an almightily dramatic hostage situation with a helpless Harold and Joy. Harold and Joy continue to have a lovely daddy/daughter relationship- poor naive Joy. Yet Harold's ultimate reaction to Wards's betrayal, the betrayal of the son he called a "disappointment" when seemingly about to be beheaded- is admiration. We learn that he, too, killed his father out of ambition. Which is, well...

Meanwhile we have the total breakdown of trust between Danny and his "brother", Davos, who continues to feel abandoned by his bettrayal of his duty to guard K'un Lun... and be with him. They clash over everything, not least the trustworthiness of Colleen, who goes on an admirable redemption journey with the loving help of Danny... who has regainedthe power of the Iron Fist. Fittingly, it is Colleen who defeats Bakuto. Yet she refuses to kill him out of ethics... only for Davos to do so, angrily fight Danny, and leave all mardy like. Well then.

We end with Danny and Colleen declaring they've found family in each other. Good, because it seems the Meachums, or at least Harold, have utterly betrayed them...

Superb telly. But what happens now?

Iron Fist: Lead Horse Back to Stable

 "I wasn't chosen. You were. And you took it and ran."

Again we get a bloody good episode. You never quite know what you're going to get with Iron Fist, but this is two very good ones on the trot."

It's fascinating seeing the dynamic between characters here. First there's Danny and Davos, friends, brothers and rivals to be chosen as Iron Fist. Yet Davos sees his brother chosen instead of him... only for Danny to be seen to desert his post. Why? We're still not really told, although we see that Danny is supposed to guard the pass to K'un Lun until he dies. "You know what the rest of your life is going to be. Quite.

Then there's the newly reunited Harold and Joy, soon plotting with Danny and Davos to take down Bakuto. Joy has made financial jiggery-pokery possible, to lure Bakuto into a trap. Yet cracks begin to appear between father and daughter. Harold's new temper once more, and Joy's qualms about the plans to kill Bakuto.

Then there's poor Colleen, the only person in the show at this point who believes in Bakuto and the Hand. Even Claire, the conscience of the show, is disappointed in her. The attempted reconciliation with a bitter Danny doesn't go well, but her loyalties are divided. It's only when she's betrayed to Bakuto by her own former proteges- that must hurt- and about to be killed by the Hand that she heroically escapes, to be reunited by Danny. Yet she's broken, betrayed by the very thing she always believed in.

Intriguingly, Danny hints at understanding how she feels. There's more to be learbed here. But first, Bakuto...

Iron Fist hasn't exactly been consistent. But it looks to be headed for a strong finish. And yes, I know, Secret Invasion. I'll get round to it.

Iron Fist: Black Tiger Steals Heart

 "Wow. You are the worst Iron Fist ever."

Oh, Iron Fist, why so inconsistent? This episode is actually pretty good, all about lies, the murkiness of the truth, whom we should believe, whom we should trust. For 2017, it's a pretty accurate harbinger of the directions in which society has moved.

Joy, of course, has been lied to, in that she was not told of her father's resurrection. Now she knows, and Harold is busy gaslighting her, with some success. Yet his temper briefly shows, and he tells his first outright lie. Yes, by murderous means, Harold performs a boardroom coup, getting the Meachums and Danny reinstated. But is Joy beginning to see through him? It's all cleverly done, with much ambiguity.

But the A-plot, with Danny and Colleen, is even murkier. All starts in a lovey-doyey way, with both of them waking up together, the adorable couple. Then Danny is properly introduced to Bakuto, who shows him more about his powers... and shows him footage of an earlier Iron Fist, from 1948.

But secrets are being kept, as a conversation between the seemingly idealistic Bakuto and the certainly naive Colleen attests. And the secret is out- Bakuto, as much as Gao, is part of the Hand, and so is Colleen. The argument between the lovers is heartbreaking. Colleen is sincere... but Danny is right. Bakuto may be less brutal than Gao, but it seems clear that his wider goals are the same- he even slots right into Gao's place in Harold's life.

And then we find out who Sacha Dhawan is playing- Davos, sent to rescue Danny and return him to K'un Lun. Danny's doubts and anger have lost him his power, his chi. And he's accused of abandoning K'un Lun... why? Worse, the two of them are only able to escape because of Colleen deciding what side she's on. I'm genuinely excited to see what happens next, and I haven't always been with Iron Fist.

Iron Fist: The Mistress of All Agonies

 "Sometimes the strongest thing you can do is leave."

Argh. This episode could have been really good. The ideas are good, the plot is even good. It's just... the script and some of the performances are not up to par.

I'd exempt Wai Ching Ho from that though. She's a chillingly evil, gaslighting power who seems powerful even when tied up and interrogated, perhaps partly because she "spend most of the 17th Century being interrogated. Then there's David Wenham as the resurrected Harold, a kind of evil Captain Jack Harkness who, Ward is told by a rival, is fated to become a little more evil with each resurrection.

Harold has quite the journey, first acting like the wandering monster in Frankenstein before remembering who his is, ultimately killing his underling suddenly and callously on a whim. He's a dangerous man, manipulating Ward into the clutches of the same psychiatrist who "treated" Danny. And then Joy has the shock of her life, falling right into his manipulative clutches. If handled better, this could have been superb, with both Gao and Harold being manipulative and evil.

But there's more- Sacha Dhawan as an assassin after Danny. Our- and Danny's- proper introduction to Bakuto. Who is he? He certainly knows a lot, to the point of knowing more aboiut what the Iron Fist can do than Danny does.

This should be good. This is a fascinating plot, on paper. Why am I not enjoying this? Because by this point things are feeling a little off.

Iron Fist: The Blessing of Many Fractures

 "Are you a moron? You thought you could end a criminal conspiracy by destroying a few test tubes?"

Iron Fist continues to be inconsistent. This episode is, on the whole, quite good. The opening is clever: Danny suspects that Gao is after his friends, Colleen makes sure Claire is safe... and Danny finds the corpse of Harold, naturally assuming the Hand was responsible, with Ward, of course, not only allowing him to think so but twisted the knife. The contrast between Danny's naive goodness and Ward's damaged cynicism could not be clearer. And the contrast permeates the episode.

Ward and Joy are offered a prisoner's dilemma of a severance package: it must be accepted by both or neither. Both play games behind each others' backs, with Joy ultimately outsmarting her brother and rejecting it, believing sjhe can fight back. Yet she does so in a way she sees as being Ward's... gathering dirt on the board. The key brother/sister scene is very touching, with Ward resolving to tell Joy all. Yet he can't, seeing blood everywhere like Lady Macbeth, something that will surely continue... and ends by being a total arse to her. Yet again.

Danny, meanwhile, supported by a loving Colleen and a wisely critical Claire (I love the letter from Luke!), rather naively resolves to go to China and get at Gao there, which leads to some rather cool adventures, not least with a drunken boxer, although I'm not sure how he can still afford this after having been ejected from Rand, knowingly or not. There are some great character scenes with him, Colleen and Claire and much discussion of the ethics of killing and revenge. Yet the most cutting comments come from the boxer: is Danny really motivated by his loyalty, as Iron Fist, to K'un Lun? 

We end with triumph, as Danny captures Gao, but not before it looked as though he would kill her. It seems it was indeed Gao who killed his parents. 

This is actually good telly. Who knows what next episode will be like.

Iron Fist: Felling Tree with Roots

 "And it makes my hand light up..."

Wow. This series is bizarrely all over the place. Last episode was pretty awful. This episode is pretty damn good. Yes, we get a very sweet, heartwarming sex scene between Colleen and Danny, the sort that feel very real between two people who genuinely feel an intimate bond. Yes, Danny has the courage of his convictions and gives a defient speech to the board of Rand, showing himself to be media savvy in the process.

Yet it's a dark, dark world. Madame Gao visits Danny in Rand's offices, where she has a pass: "I've been in Rand a lot longer than you have." She's there to troll him, yes, to annoy and disorient him, but also to warn him off. As it turns out she uses the thirteentrh floor of the building for her heroin trade. The continues to goad Danny about his father. Yet, by the end, after Danny, Collen and the Hand's rivals have trashed the heroin factory, it turns out that the whole operation is now, like much Western industry, outsourced to China. And it seems Danny's own father may have had connections to heroin too. Wow. Quite the bombshell.

The opiatre addiction between Ward and a frustrated Joy is not quite working, but it certainly shows the stress Ward is under from the way he's exploited by his manipulative, amoral father, who has Danny eating out of the palm of his hand. Ward's sudden patricide i shocking, yes, But not foreshadowed. It's quite the ending to quite an episode. Oh, and who is Bakuto? And what happens now that the board have removed Danny and the Meachums? This really feels like a turning point. Unexpectedly good.

Iron Fist: Immortal Emerges from Cage

 "I had the fastest donkey cart in K'un Lun too."

Hmm. I liked the stuff with Ward's unravelling opioid addiction, sudden though it is, and Joy's alarm. I like the arse-kicking partnership between Colleen and Claire as they protect Radovan with their complementary talents. They're quite the team.

But the stuff with Danny and that monk from his past as he spends much of the episode fighting agents of the Hand in a contest... it's just a poor man's Luke from The Empire Strikes Back, isn't it? That monk is Yoda, encouraging Danny to destroy his ego, past and feelings to be Iron Fist. He cannot be allowed anger, lust, emotion, feelings. And he must focus only on destroying the Hand even at the expense of an innocent girl's life. 

Danny's act of mercy at the end is where he leaves Dagobah and metaphorically goes to Cloud City. He and the monk from his pazst turn their backs on each other. But... we've seen this all before. With Darth Vader. It's disappointing that an episode trying to show the depth of K'un Lun and its martial arts should be so derivative and shallow. I hope things donb't stay like this; this episode shows an alarming drop in quality.

Still, Madame Gao's revelations are shocking. She's lived in K'un Lunn? She has dirt on Danny's father...?

Iron Fist: Under Leaf Pluck Lotus

 "I want the leak under the sink fixed!"

Things get more and more intriguing. There's a new, synthetic heroin on the market, being pushed by the Hand, manipulating the Rand corporation. Yet there are other kinds of drug abuse too. Ward, ignoring Harold's calls, takes pills and gets high, much to Joy's consternatiion. And Rand's drug factory appears to be emitting chemicals that cause cancer in children. We see the dodgy ethics of big business, the dangers of under-regulated capitalism, and juxtapose this with the innocence of Danny.

Speaking of said innocence, this is the episode where Danny and Colleen start exuding huge amounts of sexual chemistry and it becomes clear, in the cutest possible way, that these two socially awkward martial artists rather like each other.

Conflict is brewing between Ward and Danny about business, that is clear. Yet we also start to see both the insidiousness and the power of the Hand, with Claire Temple turning up to explain what happened in Daredevil. Suddenly, Danny, fish out of water, has a purpose. And Colleen too.

I'm not sure we quite have a format or status quo yet, but thatr's no bad thing. I'm enjoying this,

Iron Fist: Eight Diagram Dragon Palm

 "You're all I've got..."

Suddenly it all changes: Danny doesn't fall far, fortunately, and wakes up to a charm offensive by Harold, who is not dead after all. He's welcomed back into the company, 51% stake and all. Is this it? Has Danny won?

Well, no. From the start his new role has tensions. To the existing board members he's a cuckoo in the nest, and he would be wise to show some patience before throwing his weight around. Yet, on day one, the board meeting brings a moral dilemma about the pricing of a new drug... and Danny does the right thing, rather than the diplomatic thing.

There's more backstory, too. Harold did die of cancer. But he did a deal with the Hand, who resurrected him, but at the cost of secrecy and being their "good servant". Why do the hand want that pier in Red Hook, Brooklyn? They're certainly prepared to terrorise a triad for it.

Meanwhile Danny and Joy bond further, while Colleen continues with her cage fighting. I have no idea where this is going, as the arc has taken an unexpected turn. But the Hand, I'm sure, are the Big Bad. With Madame Gao at the centre of it all. I'm still enjoying this. It may not be quite as good as previous Netflix Marvel stuff, but the margin isn't great.

Iron Fist: Rolling Thunder Cannon Punch

 "It's my name!"

Like the two previous episodes, this is utterly gripping. We have the narrative of Danny trying to prove who he is and asserting his rights against the Meachums. Colleen (I liked the reference to Daughters of the Dragon) has an interesting arc with her joining in the cage fighting she'd previously denounced as dishonourable: sher's up to something. More compellingly, though, what drives the status quo forward now is connections with the wider Netflix Marvel world.

We know from laast episode that Harold wants to defy the hand. We now see him humiliated, controlled and belittlred by Madame Gao. Meanwhile, a seemingly desperate Danny finds none other than Jeri Hogarth, gains her trust, and suddenly his legal situation is looking up. The legal machinations of Jeri are hugely entertaining. What's more Danny seems to be starting to suspect that Harold may well not be quite so dead...

So far this is as good as any of its predecessors. Acting included, overall.

Iron Fist: Shadow Hawk Takes Flight

 "We're not bad guys, if that's what you think..."

For a series apparently disliked by the critics, this is pretty damn good so far. Yes, I know it's a cliche: the hero is stuck in a psychiatric ward where no one believes who he is and he's in the Catch-22 of having to pretend to be someone else- but it works here, and it's a nice means of both developing character and giving us more exposition.

So Danny was in K'un Lun, one of the seven capital cities of Heaven, that appears on Earth only once in fifteen years.There he learned to focus his chi into the Iron Fist... that won't work when he's drugged up. We see him slowly convince everyone that he's Danny- Joy, Colleen, Harold, even his doctor... who, ironically, proceeds to detain him for superhero fantasies, a nice touch.

Harold thinks Danny may be useful as an enemy of our old acquaintances the Hand... but Ward has a different agenda, as we see at the end. I'm not sure why, plot-wise, Danny's power suddenly works, but it's an awesome conclusion. More please.

Iron Fist: Snow Gives Way

 "That's my building."

"You should sell it and buy some shoes,"

Apologies, but I'm having trouble sourcing further watchable episodes of Robin of Sherwood so that will have to be paused for now. Instead, having caught up with the Disney Marvel series, I'm going to crack on with the Netflix stuff so it's hopefully done in toime for Daredevil: Born Again. I can only hope. I'll continue to alternate with other stuff, Dead Set for now.

So, Iron Fist. I read a few issuyes of Power Man and Iron Fist in the '80s not long before cancellation, mostly the Secret Wars II stuff. I vaguely know the broad strokes of the origin story. That's about it. So I enjoyed thr mystery here. It's an intriguing sert-up- Danny Rand, in theory a rich man, arrives back home after fifteen years to find himself unrecognised, friendless, homeless and, perhaps, conspired against by the family of his late father's seemingly dead business partner. The family dynamic is well developed so we get to know the characters- Danny is naive and good; Ward will always be the bully he was as a kid.

There is mystery upon mystery, though. Harold faked his death a dozen years ago: why? What happened to Danny after that plane crash, of which we see only dreamlike flashbacks. What and where is K'un Lun? Why indeed hid humanity abandon the paradise of hunter gathering for the hard slog of agriculture?

Also, we meet Colleen Wing, having met Misty Knight in Luke Cage.And we get some very, very cool and borderline supernatural martial arts. I'm aware the critics are a bit lukewarm about this show but so far I'm intrigued.