It would take me hours to tell you all the reasons Iron Fist sucks.
But frankly, Iron Fist doesn’t deserve hours of anybody’s time, and I already had to watch the damn thing, so here’s the short version. There will be spoilers.
ONE
Iron Fist’s biggest problem isn’t that it’s racist, although it could definitely be argued that it is. The biggest problem with the show is Iron Fist himself.
The character isn’t a character. It’s like they took all the many, many, MANY versions of Iron Fist from the character’s entire history, starting in 1974, tossed them into a hopper and pulled out random pieces and tried to ram them together.
It doesn’t work.
They could have done a show examining what it was like for Danny Rand to be an outsider in Kun Lun and then again in New York when he returns. Fish-out-of-water narratives can be fun.
They could have done a show about how he reacts when his long-lost privilege is regained, had him be uncomfortable with it and notice how it doesn’t really fit him anymore.
They could have done a story about a man who meets a dragon who changes his life.
They could have done a story about a man who works hard and gives everything he has for a single goal, a single job, and then works hard at that job.
They could have done a story about man determined to do good in the world, even if it costs him everything.
They could have done a story about a man who’s so desperate for family that he clings to strangers.
The problem isn’t that they didn’t do those stories. The problem is that they DID do those stories. All those stories. But obviously 13 episodes isn’t enough time to tell all those stories so all we got was fragments, little incoherent pieces of all the Danny Rands who ever lived.
Yes, they did give us a Danny Rand who didn’t know who he really is, and is trying to figure that out himself, but the problem is, they didn’t give us that Danny until about 11 episodes in. The first 10-plus hours, they gave us all the other Dannies, so that WE couldn’t tell who he really is.
The character was so bad that he screws up every part of the show he turns up for with his petulant whining and insipid entitlement.
This is a man who breaks into people’s houses, literally chases women after they tell him he’s not interested, and doesn’t seem to have any concept of personal boundaries. He steals cars and kidnaps people. If he learned all that stuff is fine in Kun Lun, they never let the audience in on that, so it just seems like Danny’s a huge asshole. And he has a huge issue with listening to women when they tell him no.
Someone should give us “Iron Fist Minus Iron Fist,” like “Garfield Minus Garfield.” Now that’d be a good show.
TWO
A show about a kung-fu hero should have great fight scenes, right? Iron Fist doesn’t have that.
For a nice change of pace, let’s talk opera for a moment.
In opera, you have two basic types of solos: arias, which are the beautiful, tuneful solos in which someone is generally reacting to what’s going on and telling you how they feel about all of it without really moving the plot forward. Arias are opera’s way of saying STOP: Hammer Time! Break it down!
The other type of solo is the opposite: the recitative, which isn’t usually beautiful but pushes the plot forward. Things are happening in the recitative.
Unlike opera, however, a good fight scene should cover the functions of an aria and a recitative. It should tell the watchers how the protagonist feels, but it should also move the plot forward.
A great example of this is the hallway scene in Daredevil where Matt goes to rescue a small child despite being badly wounded and thoroughly exhausted. He is bone-tired and it shows in every kick and every punch, but he fights through it because he’s determined to rescue the child. Bam, aria function fulfilled. Matt also has a reason to be there–he’s rescuing a child who ended up in danger because of something he did. Bam, recitative function fulfilled.
There are precious few fights in Iron Fist that even fulfill these two criteria alone, and that’s without adding a third component: the fight scenes should be fun to watch. Yes, that’s right, Iron Fist forgot to make its fight scenes fun to watch, for the most part. There are a few scenes where the show almost manages it–there’s a flirtation with the “let’s switch weapons” fight idea, there’s a flirtation with the “get them both down at once” fight idea, there’s a flirtation with the “master and student” fight idea, and there’s a flirtation with the “different styles” fight idea.
But like the idea of the Iron Fist character, none of these elements are developed into a coherent fight scene that fulfills all three requirements of a good fight scene.
Well, I shouldn’t say NEVER, because there is just one really, really great fight scene in Iron Fist: it’s the one with the Drunken Master, who manages to get Danny to react like a human being when he points out, rightly, that even though he’s a disgusting sloppy drunk, at least HE is doing his damn job.
The drunk is preventing Danny from getting into a building to try to kidnap Madame Gao, so the fight moves the plot forward, fulfilling the recitative function. It shows Danny failing at communicating who he is and why he does anything, so it shows us his feelings, and as he gets more upset the action does reflect that, so it fulfills the aria function.
And because the drunken fighting style is pretty different from anything else in the show, and very different from Danny’s style, AND because Danny’s opponent is played by a fantastic actor and martial artist, the fight scene is super fun to watch, too.
Of course it wouldn’t be Iron Fist if the show allowed us a moment of unalloyed happiness and pure joy. The actor playing the drunk auditioned for the role of Iron Fist and somehow did not get it, because there is no justice, God hates us and karma is a terrible lie.
THREE
Everyone in this show is nearly terminally stupid. Even characters who existed in other shows, like Claire, become stupider when they’re in this show.
For example, when Danny comes back, neither of the people who grew up with him think of asking him about something only Danny would know or remember. Danny doesn’t think of it either. Why not ask him about playing Monopoly, like what tokens the kids all liked to use? We even saw them play Monopoly together as part of the show! They obviously spent a ton of time together! For some reason, no one thinks of that. Danny just repeats “I’m Danny!” over and over again for multiple episodes, expecting that to be enough.
Later, Ward hires hitmen who are easily traced back to him.
That’s not all, though. Colleen is unbearably stupid too–she apparently falls for Danny. Ugh. What’s wrong with her?
And after Danny regains control of the Rand company, he barges into a board discussion about a new miracle drug that the board wants to charge $50 a pop for. Then they want to put the profits back into research and development costs, to help fund new drugs. That’s right, they don’t want to pocket the profits and bring home a million extra dollars each… they want to put it back into the company so the company can do more research and development and find more new miracle drugs.
This is important because Danny decides that’s not right and insists they charge only cost for the drug… eliminating any possibility of funding new miracle drugs and keeping the company from making even a modest, tiny profit. You know, there are numbers between $0 and $50, Danny, and some of them would allow you to keep investing in new medical advances without screwing poor people over.
The Good Parts
Iron Fist does have some good things about it. There aren’t a lot of them, but there are some.
- Days of Our Meachums is great. If we could just give the Meachum family their own show and forget all about Iron Fist altogether it would be fantastic–it’d be Dallas, but with ninjas and some weird, messed-up magic, all nestled around an uncomfortably realistic portrayal of an abusive family that has warped around the cruelty of its patriarch. DALLAS WITH MAGIC NINJAS, YOU GUYS.
- The costuming. I love the way Colleen dresses–like a real person and not like someone trying to be sexy for a television show. Every one of her outfits is appropriate for what she wears it for. Joy looks great too–all her clothes are beautiful and feminine without being soft, and it really fits her personality well.
- Madame Gao. No matter what, she is exactly where she chooses to be and says exactly what she wants to say. This is probably the most formidable villain in the series so far, and she’s smart enough to run rings around Danny. Then again, so is cheese.
- Davos. He’s usually not wrong and he shows a bit of charming naivete from time to time–a quality which could have helped us like Danny, if Danny’d had it instead.
- Ward. He’s actually the hero of the movie, and not in a metaphorical way. He’s the one who has a character arc, who changes and learns and becomes a better person with great effort, through suffering and dramatic events. The movie ends when he does a heroic thing and kills (then cremates) his evil, terrifying abuser.
- Sometimes Iron Fist isn’t onscreen.
Other than that, though… I’m sorry to say it–I was looking forward to it and I loved Daredevil and Luke Cage–but Iron Fist is just plain Reel Bad.
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