In the grand spectrum of video game adaptations for the screen,Twisted Metalis near the top of the pack. Streaming TV has proven to be a far better outlet for these translations, pumping out classics likeThe Last of UsandCastlevania.Twisted Metalcan’t quite stand among the best of the best, but it’s far better than it has any right to be. Still, critics were divided on the first race through the wasteland. What can the show do to keep its impressive viewership metrics and win a little more respect from the pros?
Twisted Metalis the lone video game adaptation currently on Peacock. Among the streaming services, Paramount+ and Netflix dominate video game adaptations.Paramount+ stakes a weird amountof their releases around animated and live-action takes on video games, while Netflix has several of the best entries. HBO hasThe Last of Usand Amazon hasFallout. As a lone entry,Twisted Metaldoesn’t feel like enough to push for more. This is far from the only front in the streaming war, but it is an interesting one.
Rhett Reese & Paul Wernick, and Michael Johnathan Smith
Stars
Anthony Mackie, Stephanie Beatriz, Joe Seanoa, Will Arnett, Thomas Haden Church, and Anthony Carrigan
10
Streaming On
Peacock
Twisted Metalseason two has room to improve
If there’s one central weakness toTwisted Metal, it’s that it doesn’t go far enough in any particular direction. The tone is cartoonishly wacky, with very little of the horrific darkness behind the best entries in the game series. It’s also rarely laugh-out-loud funny, with a lot of gags that feel pulled from a scrappedfirst-draft James Gunn script. Narratively, the first season feels like almost five hours of setup before the show can get into the stuff fans were looking for. The plot is a loose excuse to allow for a few stunt driving sequences and a lot of slapstick fight scenes. Crucially, that lack of stunt driving is a huge weight on the show. There’s a bizarre absence of focus that grinds the show to several frequent and offputting halts. Overall, it hits the mark, delivering mindless funthrough the usual channels, but it feels like a show that could have been so much more. The solutions are obvious, and they may be inevitable.
Twisted Metalis a fine show, but it still hasplenty of room to improve. The first season could have been an opening salvo before the real story starts with the second. It’s worth sticking around to watch asTwisted Metalgets deeper into the games in season 2.
