The 10th Kingdom is a Hallmark miniseries about a woman, Virginia, and her father, Tony, who travel through a portal in Central Park to the land of the Nine Kingdoms, where fairy tales are real. And this realm has troubles. The Evil Queen has escaped from prison and used her magic to change Prince Wendall, descendant of Snow White, into a dog and the dog into Prince Wendall. Wendall-as-dog escapes through a magic mirror into the mythical 10th Kingdom, which is none other than present-day New York. A set of bumbling troll siblings and a half-man, half-wolf named...Wolf...follow him to capture him. Virginia, her father, and Wendall end up going into the land of the kingdoms where they hook up with Wolf and spend the entire rest of the series trying to find the magic mirror to get back home (and saving the Nine Kingdoms from the Queen).
For the most part, the actors are good. Scott Cohen brings a great playfulness to Wolf that keeps the story bubbly (did I just say bubbly?). He is perhaps the most developed character in the series (actually, most of them aren't that well developed)--his motives conflict and he has to try to make the best decisions based on what he really wants, which can be a challenge. Tony is played with conviction by John Larroquette. Tony is the guy who is in constant disbelief and frustration that they've entered a realm where fairy tale tropes are real. He's a real fish-out-of-water and Larroquette plays him just like you would expect someone to act who has been thrown into another world. Warwick Davis also shows up as a dwarf. Somehow, every time he's in a scene, you feel like your favorite high-fantasy book has been brought to life, and the story is more fun to watch. The main character, Virginia, could have used some work. I found her personality grating, whiny, and overly-mean, and wanted either someone stronger and less of a pain for a main protagonist, or someone who starts out incompetent and becomes truly self-reliant and strong by the end.
Now the villains. The three troll siblings are completely inept, but their antics are sometimes good for a laugh. Other times, they're plain annoying (I also found dog-as-Wendell completely annoying and unfunny and started skipping all his scenes). A better villain is Rutger Hauer as the Huntsman. Yes, this guy is scary. He knows what he's doing--he's good at tracking, is stealthy, and has a magic crossbow whose bolts don't stop until they hit the heart of a living creature. Yes, run away from this guy fast. Even though if he's shooting at you, running won't do any good. Yep. Good job there. Just cut the trolls and put in more of this guy. Now, there's nothing wrong with having more than one set of villains stalking the heroes. Avatar: The Last Airbender did it effectively with Zuko and Zhao in season 1 and Zuko and Azula in season 2. But here, the trolls are so inept that we never feel that the heroes are in any danger from them, which is always a mistake when trying to create suspense. Maybe the Queen should have become frustrated that the siblings failed so miserably and asked the Huntsman to kill the trolls.
Dianne Wiest is wonderfully chilling as the main villain, the Queen. She doesn't count on her minions to do everything right. She will go out herself and do what needs to be done so that she can realise her goal of ruling the Nine Kingdoms. When she says that she will kill your children if you disobey her orders, you believe her. She may look weak, but at one point, when she does something similar to what Livia does in I, Claudius, you realise that she has the situation under control. And I have to give a shout-out to whoever designed her wardrobe. They give her dresses that look practical to wear but also have high collars that look like what Maleficent sports in Sleeping Beauty, along with a green velvet cloak. Her clothes are reminiscent of Disney cartoons without being cartoony.
I also liked the depiction of Snow White, "the fairest in the land," as somewhat overweight. Back in the times when these fairy tales were written down (and this series is based on the original tales), being plump was desirable for a woman--it showed that she got enough to eat, and it was thought that she could have more children if she were bigger. The super-skinny look of today would be seen on peasant women who couldn't get enough to eat. Kudos to the casting/wardrobe department for getting that detail right.
The best bits come when the show sends up fairy tales. Tony and Wolf need a magic axe at one point. They find the Woodsman, who will give them the axe if they guess his name. If they fail to guess, the Woodsman will decapitate Wolf. Tony, your average janitor, cannot believe what kind of twisted scenario this is. He says this world is full of "homicidal maniacs," and, looking at my collection of Grimm's fairy tales, if you were to make them all come to life, he's right. Grimm's stories have some horribly twisted elements in them, like dancing in iron-hot shoes, being decapitated and having your animals friends sew your head back on, being dragged naked in a barrel full of sharp nails until you're dead, being tricked into decapitating your daughter over an apron, and having to spend the rest of your life covered in pitch. Yeah, unpleasant stuff, and seeing them brought to life would be completely appalling to someone modern like Tony (whereas to a guy like Wolf who grew up in this place, it's entirely normal). And we relate to his disgust. My favorite scene is the part where the group has to choose from two doors, one which will lead them onward and one which the frog guardian says "leads to a horrible death." Tony decides he's had enough with these fairy tale situations and...yeah, I won't spoil it for you. But let me tell you: that little scene was worth the three dollars I spent for the DVDs and the entire seven-and-a-half hour trip through an uneven story.
Deary me, does this series have problems.
Let me tell you a bit about the plot. Tony, who had been imprisoned, finally breaks out and is reunited with Virginia and Wolf. They run to the boat where Tony knows the magic mirror is...but they just miss it by a few minutes. After sailing, they arrive at town...where they've just missed the dwarf on the boat by a few minutes. They eventually meet him in the woods...and he's just traded the mirror half an hour ago. They travel to the town, go through a convoluted contest to win the mirror...and then they just--you know what? I'm getting really irritated by the constant near-misses here. It's cliché, it's repetitive, and it's plain bad writing. Not only that, but them just missing the mirror after they've won it makes the entire annoying foray into the shepherd town completely pointless. Through a good portion of the show, the characters go from magical town to magical town, like the writers wanted to drag them through every fairy tale motif without pausing to think of the best way to do that to serve the story and characters well. Yes, it does feel like the writers are dragging the story along, when instead it should feel like the characters have to go to these places because of their own decisions and motivations.
Let me tell you a little more. (small spoiler warning) The Woodsman is one second away from decapitating Wolf when a Dea ex Machina--sorry, a bird--flies by and tells Tony the name of the Woodsman. Wendall-as-dog arrives just a second before Virginia is about to lose a contest and helps her win it. The heroes arrive at an auction for the magic mirror a second before--GRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!! SOMEONE GET SOMEWHERE AHEAD OF TIME FOR A CHANGE!!$#&**!*#&$#%#%%#@^#!@!
.......................
..............................
Okay, I'm feeling a lot calmer now. Near-misses and timely arrivals are not suspenseful. It's irritating that the writers couldn't think of a better way to create suspense than to have someone arrive just in the nick of time to save the heroes. As Francie says in Betty Smith's A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, "What if the hero had been held up and couldn't make it?" She doesn't like these last-minute saves because they don't feel authentic--they feel written and contrived. They certainly can be well-written and convincing, and having one of them in certain kinds of stories is okay, but more than that, even in a fairy tale, is cheap and contrived, and all the coincidences and contrivances bring the show down terribly.
In addition, The 10th Kingdom could have used more character development. As I said above, Wolf is done well. The others, not so much. Take Tony--at the beginning, he has no problem sleeping with another man's wife. At the end (SPOILER WARNING) Wendell gets him to stay in the Nine Kingdoms by enticing him with sex with young women. (END SPOILER) That was completely unnecessary and a bit disgusting. Tony even mentions at one point that he knew his wife was sleeping with other men. So, maybe he has no problem having sex with others at the beginning because his wife did the same thing. By the end, he should have shaken off his insecurities. Using sex to get someone to do something is not funny, it's gross. He also wastes six wishes on selfish things like beer and slavery (though the last wish he makes is very useful). That's fine at the beginning to show kind of a person he is, but he doesn't seem to learn anything important from the experience. Near the end in the swamp scene, he still acts stupidly and selfishly, apparently not having learned anything from being in the land of fairy stories. In fact (SPOILER WARNING He doesn't even return to New York at the end so that he doesn't have to work as a janitor or accept responsibility for what his wishes created. Not a good moral. (END SPOILER)
Because this is a story based on fairy tales, I can accept a plot-driven story. However, it would have been a great subversion to have had the characters drive this story, since so few fairy tales are driven by the characters, and motivations are fairly simple.
Bottom line: this series needed some serious editing and tightening-up around the shepherd and Kissing towns. And preferably changed to something that wasn't so sappy. Around two-thirds of the way through, after a critical spoilerific moment, the show does improve. Things go horribly wrong for the heroes and they have to get by on their own abilities, which thankfully counters the contrivances of the earlier parts. Near the end, they also have to do more with the save-the-Kingdoms plot line, which is much more interesting than the find-the-mirror plot line (and it could be just me, but I found many of the denizens of the Kingdoms so appalling and so extreme in their adherences to fairy tale conventions that I don't know if their way of life is worth saving, which is a problem audience-sympathy-wise). So, to summarise: decent opening overall, sagging middle after the forest sequence, and good ending after Kissing Town. It could have also used some more character development. On a positive note, the special effects look good and not at all dated.
When it's good, it's gold; when it's bad, it's pretty bad. Worth a trip if you like fantasy stories. For better trapped-in-another-dimension stories, try The Twelve Kingdoms (no relation), Now and Then, Here and There (the ultimate deconstruction) and Back to the Future (yes, it is). For a good fantasy for adults, watch Carnivàle.
No comments:
Post a Comment