Distributor: 20th Century Fox
Episodes: 12
Duration: 42 minutes (per episode)
The Gifted: Season 1 (DVD) – Series Review
It’s widely known that 20th Century Fox held the rights to the X-Men movies. This is the sole reason why the X-Men don’t appear in the Marvel cinematic universe that has been built by Disney, simply because they were not allowed to. While Sony did come to an agreement to let Spider-Man in the Disney movies, it seems 20th Century Fox refused to do so. Nonetheless, some rights have been turned to Disney, like the rights for The Gifted, which was cancelled after the studio gave up the rights. Does this make this series useless to watch? Well, we don’t think so, but it’s possible you’re watching something without a proper ending, as it was cancelled after the second season.
We are thrown into a world where mutants are being prosecuted for nearly no reason, without that much extra information. We see a chase at the beginning of the series, but soon after we get introduced to the Strucker family, which consists of the father, Reed (Stephen Moyer), the mother, Kate (Amy Acker), the daughter Lauren (Natalie Alyn Lind) and finally the son, Andy (Percy Hynes White). Reed works as a prosecutor, mainly in mutant cases. He has put many people with gifts behind bars and thinks he is doing the right thing. Sadly, the family’s lives are turned upside down when something happens and Andy’s powers manifest, and Lauren has to expose her powers to calm her brother down. Now Reed and his family have to flee because Sentinel Services is looking to arrest the children. The family has to cope with the kids having powers, which is quite troublesome. Especially now that they have to find help from the mutants Reed normally puts behind bars.
We are thrown in the world of the X-Men, after they have vanished. Certain events happened making it so that mutants can be prosecuted a lot easier. The flow of the series is just right, as episodes are quite eventful without any real dull moments. You’ll get enough information to understand what is going on, even when not really knowing anything from the X-Men movies or even the franchise for that matter. The season only has twelve episodes and this feels just about right.
The acting performances are actually top-notch as there are a lot of cast members who have prior experience in other bigger shows. We have Amy Acker who starred as one of the lead characters in Person of Interest, Natalie Alyn Lind who got a lot of experience under her belt from The Goldbergs and Gotham, the latter in which Jamie Cheung also starred. Stephen Moyer had an important role in True Blood and so on. It’s easy to say that the cast members did a superb job, even when working with what seemed to be a more limited budget in terms of special effects and resources. The characters seem to have proper development and some of the more known characters, such as Polaris or the Frost sisters do the original characters justice.
Sadly, the DVD edition of the Gifted: Season 1 comes with no special features, which makes it ever so clear that the series has been cancelled and that this is a last attempt to earn some money for the resources that went into the series. It would have been nice if something extra was featured on the physical edition, as now it just feels like a very bland edition to have in your DVD collection.
Something we don’t talk about in other reviews, but we felt like we should mention it when reviewing the first season of The Gifted. We noticed there were a lot of spelling mistakes in the (Dutch) subtitles, which is actually something that doesn’t really give the best impression of a physical release. We know the series has been cancelled, but like this, it feels like a quick cash-grab by dressing up a decaying corpse and slapping a nice outfit on it.
Conclusion
The Gifted: Season 1 is a fun and qualitative spin-off series that situates itself in the Marvel universe. It shows us the dark side of the medallion in a world where there are no hero icons anymore such as the X-Men. It’s sad to see that the series has been cancelled, as it offers quality acting, a fun plot, interesting characters and an overall nice atmosphere. Even though the series doesn’t run anymore, it’s still worth the watch.
No Comments