I don't think most people realize, even to this day, just what an amazing feat Marvel pulled off when they released Avengers, and more recently Civil War. Pulling off successful ensemble team up's are a LOT harder than most people think and it was Marvel's choice to go with many individual films first before going with the team up films that made them so successful. It really allowed the team up films to jump right into the stories without any big character introductions or long exposition scenes to set up relationships or what was going on. Even the main antagonist for Avengers (Loki) was a character we already knew from Thor. Basically, Marvel really set things up perfectly with its motion pictures and in so doing really created the perfect blueprint for super hero films in general.
So with all that being said, one would think that Marvel should have had the same success with The Defenders since each character has already had its own individual series before Defenders, but unfortunately Defenders had one thing going against it that wasn't present with the motion pictures, that being that the characters and the series in general were very unique and stylistically very different from one another, in just about every way possible. Even the cinematography style of the shows differed quite dramatically. So bringing these 4 charatcers and styles together into a single show was going to be very challenging, even more so than the ensemble films IMO.
And for some strange reason, Marvel didn't take advantage of the advantages that having individual shows can give you like they did with Avengers and Civil War. Again, with Avengers we already knew most of the main players including the main antagonist and that really allowed Avengers to jump right into the main story and that gave the film just a stellar pace as again there was really no need for introductions or long exposition scenes explaining what was going on. The different pieces just came together perfectly. Yet with Defenders, Marvel largely keeps these characters separate from one another for a significant portion of the series. It isn't even really until half way through that the team really comes together. That causes a couple of problems. First and most importantly, the initial episodes have to jump back and forth between all of the various characters and the show really doesn't even feel like a team up show at this point. And 2nd, it makes the blending of the various styles of the shows that much more difficult since the first 4 episodes basically stick with the styles of the individual shows depending on what character your watching at any given time instead of creating a new style for this ensemble,
What you ultimately wind up with is a series that really struggles in its first half of the season. Die hard super hero fans or huge fans of the individual series might not have too much a problem with this aspect of the show, but for the general population or for those that aren't die hard super hero fans....well, the first half of the Defenders will definitely be viewed by most as the weakest first half of all the shows released to date. Hopefully it doesn't stop too many people from finishing the show as once the team actually comes together, its a VASTLY more successful show. While the uniqueness of the individual shows makes it more difficult to make an ensemble, the uniqueness of the actual characters themselves makes for a very interesting team once it actually comes together.
All in all, Defenders is still a good show and many Marvel/super hero fans in general will still wind up enjoying it. Unfortunately, its just not as good as it could have been as the first half of the show really struggles to find its feet and most importantly to mesh the various characters and styles into an individual show. Once it does tho, The Defenders shines just like everything else Marvel seems to touch these days. Its just a shame that it takes almost half the series to really reach that point.
7/10
So with all that being said, one would think that Marvel should have had the same success with The Defenders since each character has already had its own individual series before Defenders, but unfortunately Defenders had one thing going against it that wasn't present with the motion pictures, that being that the characters and the series in general were very unique and stylistically very different from one another, in just about every way possible. Even the cinematography style of the shows differed quite dramatically. So bringing these 4 charatcers and styles together into a single show was going to be very challenging, even more so than the ensemble films IMO.
And for some strange reason, Marvel didn't take advantage of the advantages that having individual shows can give you like they did with Avengers and Civil War. Again, with Avengers we already knew most of the main players including the main antagonist and that really allowed Avengers to jump right into the main story and that gave the film just a stellar pace as again there was really no need for introductions or long exposition scenes explaining what was going on. The different pieces just came together perfectly. Yet with Defenders, Marvel largely keeps these characters separate from one another for a significant portion of the series. It isn't even really until half way through that the team really comes together. That causes a couple of problems. First and most importantly, the initial episodes have to jump back and forth between all of the various characters and the show really doesn't even feel like a team up show at this point. And 2nd, it makes the blending of the various styles of the shows that much more difficult since the first 4 episodes basically stick with the styles of the individual shows depending on what character your watching at any given time instead of creating a new style for this ensemble,
What you ultimately wind up with is a series that really struggles in its first half of the season. Die hard super hero fans or huge fans of the individual series might not have too much a problem with this aspect of the show, but for the general population or for those that aren't die hard super hero fans....well, the first half of the Defenders will definitely be viewed by most as the weakest first half of all the shows released to date. Hopefully it doesn't stop too many people from finishing the show as once the team actually comes together, its a VASTLY more successful show. While the uniqueness of the individual shows makes it more difficult to make an ensemble, the uniqueness of the actual characters themselves makes for a very interesting team once it actually comes together.
All in all, Defenders is still a good show and many Marvel/super hero fans in general will still wind up enjoying it. Unfortunately, its just not as good as it could have been as the first half of the show really struggles to find its feet and most importantly to mesh the various characters and styles into an individual show. Once it does tho, The Defenders shines just like everything else Marvel seems to touch these days. Its just a shame that it takes almost half the series to really reach that point.
7/10