'Halo' Season Two Episode 3 Review
Image Source: IGN
I talk a lot about why adapting a show from a game is difficult, and it is. It’s even more so doing it from a first-person shooter like Halo to a serialized show like the Paramount+ adaptation. It is hard on fans as well, and I’ve tried to make the point that we have to temper our expectations, as we are basing them on a thing designed for a game, and then they’re trying to make a character-centered show from that. It’s going to involve adding things that weren’t there in the game and modifying those that were.
With that said, that is where I try to approach these reviews. I focus on the storytelling and final product given to us.
Episode three of season two, Visegrad, is a prime example of why it’s difficult to separate oneself from the fan of the game and the reviewer of the still-developing show. This episode was clearly a transitionary one, and that is clear by the final moments. Looking back through the episode and the season, even some things from season one, there are these smaller, personal stories in this season that are meant to be wrapped up by the end.
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Chief gets Silver Team into hot water by following down a lead he thinks was Cobalt Team never leaving Reach. They follow him to a communications relay station that has gone dark, and just as they’re about to get confirmation, they’re found out by the UNSC and placed under arrest. Chief is portrayed as crazy, and it damages his bond with his team. Riz goes to visit the blind Spartan at his home, meets his husband, and learns more about herself. Kai goes to Ackerson about Chief and wants to take over his investigation. Chief goes to Parangosky and Perez, having ditched his escort for a psychiatric evaluation. All of this while Ackerson reveals to Keyes the grim truth: the Covenant are on Reach, and their fleet will be there soon. That devastating reality comes at the end when Chief listens to a recording that Perez found of the Covenant telling the people of Reach their time is near, and the church they’re in explodes as the bombardment begins.
There are hits and misses in this episode, more so misses, but the way the episode ends helps redeem it from being a waste of an episode.
Image Source: GameRant
I continue to be frustrated by stories that feel shoehorned in, and some getting more time than they should. I have not been shy about my feelings on the Kwan Ha inclusion, and that continues to be the case. Where it’s going is still a mystery, and though I have my theories, it’s taking entirely too long and continues to feel out of place among the greater narrative. The revelation that Ackerson has a sick father that he’s been caring for was interesting, but by the end of the episode, it feels hollow and ultimately did nothing that it could have done. We learn the old man is sick, and that he knows the Covenant are coming. Then Ackerson reveals he’s going to abandon Reach, and his father, and gives him a suicide pill so they don’t “take him alive.” I found myself asking what was the point of all this? Were we supposed to think there’s a good side to Ackerson and his cowardice, his lack of trying to do anything about the impending invasion of Reach? It was so introduced and finished so fast that I just didn’t care that the man was even part of the episode.
This takes me back to what I was saying at the beginning. It is hard to separate the Halo game fan from the reviewer watching the show unfold. The game is all focused on the Spartans and those around them. Not to sound like I can’t do what I said, but that should be the main focus of the show, and the parts that do are the best of it. If the issues above had a clearer justification for how they fit into all this, it’d be a different story, but nearly a season-and-a-half into the series and I still don’t know where they’re going with the other stories grows more frustrating.
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The far more interesting, and relevant, stories here are the Spartans. Watching Kai, Riz, and Chief try to navigate their humanity as the Covenant close in, as they build relationships with others around them, is good, and really goes far to make you want these characters to make it through what’s about to happen. Remove the Kwan Ha and Ackerson father-son bonding and this episode would have been incredible for the story with how it ended. The showrunners have done a better job of having that tension ever present in the background, culminating in a fantastic scene with Perez seeking solace in religion, Chief listening with growing dread to the darker side proselytize about their imminent arrival to destroy Reach, and then the world erupts in fire. Beautiful
With that ending, the rest of the season has set up a promise to be an intense battle for survival that hopefully delivers if the show has a desire to continue beyond two seasons.
Rating: 7/10
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Source(s): Paramount+
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