Halo, on Paramount+, Is a Videogame-to-TV Adaptation that Didn't Get Owned in the Process

For those who aren39t familiar with franchise at all here39s the simple version Master Chief a genetically and technologically enhanced soldier known as a Spartan fights for the human race against the Covenant an alliance of alien races united by religious beliefs that revolve around the location and activation of ancient colossal ringshaped structures referred to as quothalosquot While members of the Covenant believe the halos will bring their ancient forefathers the Forerunners back to the physical realm in actuality the halo array is designed to wipe all sentient life from the galaxy in order to starve out an otherwise unstoppable species of space parasite known as quotthe Floodquot In pursuit of this the Covenant is in an allout genocidal war with the Human race who without Master Chief would be utterly doomedThe universe in the show is officially set in a slightly different timeline so while many of the players sights and sounds are familiar if not identical the storyline they39re all appearing in is unique to this new series though I imagine they39ll mirror major events pretty closely not unlike Star Trek39s new timeline in the JJ Abrams films In the game players primarily experience the story through Master Chief39s eyes quite literally in fact considering it39s a firstperson shooter In the series however Master Chief is not us we39re watching him in the third person which is an aspect of the conversion from game to screen that I imagine influenced the decision to ultimately show his face You see in the games we never ever saw our hero39s actual face Sure as the franchise progressed there were some close shaves during a cut scene or two We may have seen a close up of his hands dropping the helmet into frame implying that his face was visible offcamera and we39ve even gotten straight up shots of the back of his head but not once in the span of 24 games has the Halo franchise had this much candor about the physical appearance of Chief39s face or his premilitary backstory for that matter This may also be why the show39s narrative centers on MC39s childhood memories and their apparent connection to quotthe artifactquot which will eventually lead whoever has it to a Halo though that much hasn39t been confirmed on the actual series yetThe opening episode feels slow at first but don39t get me wrong by quotat firstquot I only mean the first couple of minutes Right after that some Covenant elites show up looking for that quotartifactquot and proceed to plasma blast a group of high teenagers on a mining planet named Madrigal into literal chunks No exaggeration The lone survivor Kwan Ha played by Yerin Ha gets away and warns the village she lives in on this outer rim colony planet but her people end up being no match for these alien soldiers Her village is massacred women children everyone but not before Master Chief and his threeSpartan squad Silver Team arriveThis was the point where the connection between the game and the show first occurred for me The action sequence that followed was long exciting and packed with visuals and sound effects that were extremely reminiscent of the Xbox title39s gameplay experience There were even a couple of moments that went full firstperson via Master Chief again just like in the game and even though that39s a well we hopefully won39t drink from too often it was still cool to see especially right at the start of the seriesFast forward we39re three episodes in and this most recent episode is the first appearance of Cortana the AI in Master Chief39s suit that39s been with him since Combat Evolved Her character is just as iconic as Master Chief39s if not more so and to prove it years ago Microsoft named their AIbased digital assistant a la Siri or Alexa after her That39s probably why the TV version of Cortana while visually different is still voiced by the actor who voices her in the games the legendary Jen TaylorThe show has its differences from the game series obviously but the spirit of it is still there My concern however is the amount of time that we continue to see Chief39s helmetless face The Mandalorian on Disney has already proven that a series can survive with a principal who39s face we see maybe once every ten episodes but it seems like Halo39s determined to show us less and less of the iconic character in his full garb In the third episode of the series Chief didn39t have his complete suit on even once In fact we saw him in sneakers Then we saw him naked I guess my concern is that the less we see of the suit the more alienated some of the original property39s fans will continue to feel Kind of like what happened with Tony Stark in Iron Man 3 where he spent most of the film sans suitMy point is other franchises have fatally misinterpreted what aspects of these properties would successfully translate from gaming console to streaming services like Uncharted a film that I imagine was cast by an AI programmed only to cause pain and confusion Mark Wahlberg How But I will say that the Halo team has been more quotonquot than quotoffquot with their decisions They39ve built real 360degree sets custom Halo body armor for Chief and his fellow Spartans provided quotbootcampquot training in Budapest for the Spartan actors and seem to strive to match the cinematic quality of the games themselves which as mentioned before has always been a standout aspect of the franchiseI find myself intrigued by how far this whole thing will go and I39m pleased to say that at risk of dating myself this is a videogametoTVshow convert that didn39t get quotpwnedquot in the processClick the social buttons to share this content with your friends and colleaguesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this content are exclusively the views of the author andor subjects and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc management or associated writers

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Halo, on Paramount+, Is a Videogame-to-TV Adaptation that Didn't Get Owned in the Process

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Ainsley Andrade

FEMA and the Ad Council Encourage AANHPI Communities to Enhance Disaster Preparedness in New PSAs - Ad Council InSites

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Halo, on Paramount+, Is a Videogame-to-TV Adaptation that Didn't Get Owned in the Process

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Ainsley Andrade

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