Saturday, August 31, 2019

Return of the Crystal

I caught the first episode of the new Dark Crystal prequel series last night, Age of Resistance, on NetFlix. So far I love the visuals. The Geflings are about as inexpressive as they were in the old film, all the other characters consequently being much more interesting to watch, particularly the Skeksis.

Among an impressive voice cast, Mark Hamill may be the most recognisable--he plays skekTek, a Skeksis, as a slightly gruffer version of his Joker.

I may have misinterpreted something, but I feel like the backstory has been altered slightly from the original film, or maybe the opening narration of Resistance is intentionally misleading--the Skeksis are now introduced as foreign invaders rather than beings that split from the Mystics as a result of a shard breaking from the Crystal. Judging from the title of the series, I wondered if we were going to be getting a political allegory. With the Skeksis as immigrants, that may be so, though it's a more right wing allegory than I was expecting. Unless the Skeksis are supposed to be Russians.

Or maybe it's just like the Normans invading England, though the Anglo-Saxons put up more of a fight than the Gelflings seem to have.

One thing's for sure, the sets and creature designs are top notch. I certainly look forward to seeing the rest of this show.

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