I do not read comics and only watched “Moon Knight” (2022) because it is the sixth television series in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (“MCU”). There is only a slight reference to the “Black Panther” franchise when a character mentions in passing the ancestral plane, an afterlife. There are six episodes, and they are all under one hour so a determined person could watch it in one sitting. Mostly the lemon is not worth the squeeze, and it is painful to watch superb actors give annoying performances while the supporting characters seem more interesting. Steven Grant (Oscar Isaac) works at the National Art Gallery hoping to become a tour guide in the Egyptian wing, but everyone finds him off putting, and whenever he makes some headway in life, he somehow screws it up. At night, he chains himself to his bed so he will not sleepwalk, but nothing goes according to plan, and he wakes up in another country hearing multiple voices in his head: Marc Spector (Isaac) and Khonshu (F. Murray Abraham for vocals), the Egyptian moon god. Is he dreaming or is it real?
Proof that Isaac is hot: “Moon Knight” exists, and it isn’t good. Isaac plays a character who either suffers from dissociative identity disorder or two separate people somehow sharing one body. MCU is beginning to run out of money because whenever things get interesting, it dwells on Steven waking up and discovering that Marc has dispatched all the bad guys, which is more interesting than what the series shows the home viewers. It builds up anticipation for Marc’s eventual reveal, but Steven, though sweet, is almost too annoying for anyone who is not attracted to men to hang in there. By the end of the narrative, it makes sense, but you still must endure it to get some semblance of a reward. Steven has the most annoying British accent. The Herculean levels required to suspend disbelief that people would not be willing to overlook his flaws for his looks is too much to bear. It is the most fictional part of the story. Marc is a pretty standard issue angsty hero whose past haunts him. The costume choice to distinguish the duo was clever. Marc wants to protect his wife, Layla El-Faouly (May Calamawy).
Why could not Layla be the protagonist with Steven/Marc as her supporting characters? Layla does not originally appear in the comics, but Arthur Harrow (Ethan Hawke) is a bit character in the source material so why not make the switch. They did in “Hawkeye” so who would know? “Moon Knight” really leans on the Egyptian theme, and Calamawy is Egyptian. It felt more like her origin story, which is far more interesting. Using Layla as an adventurous entry point into this world would not have been as annoying as Steven or as one note, been there/done that, as Marc. She could have been looking for her husband, and the story would not have to change too much. Also it was hard to buy that Steven knew more about ancient Egypt mythology than a second-generation archeologist. Because “Moon Knight” puts her in the back seat for too long., it begins to feel as if Layla was modeled after Evie in “The Mummy” franchise, but she is not. In the end, it was “Iron Fist” all over again, which is frustrating. Calamawy was so good that she could have redeemed “Wonder Woman 1984” (2020) if she played the titular character.
“Moon Knight” is where great actors go to play characters that even they fail to make interesting. Isaac and Hawke seem to be racing to the bottom, and Hawke wins. His character, Arthur Harrow, is Khonshu’s enemy thus Steven and Marc’s enemy, but the zealot is made to be so indomitable that he is inexplicably able to outwit and overpower gods. It never felt believable how good Arthur was at manipulating anyone by speaking softly, moving slowly then holding hands. It got old fast since he was clearly bad news. Dear MCU, is there a reason that powers are depicted with the same color purple? It is visually getting boring, and I hate it. It would have been nice if the show spent more time showing Arthur’s perfect world before switching gears to expose that he is an obvious maniacal nutjob. All good villains are convincing, but he kills a sympathetic demographic in the first episode so that jig was up quickly. Again, could not an Egyptian person play the role? Watching Hawke was like watching the second coming of David Carradine, and there is no good reason for it. Hawke said that he modeled his performance on several fictional and real-life people, which included Jimmy Swaggart, who could be called many things, but a snoozefest is not one of them.
The depiction of the gods felt phoned in as if not enough screentime and development was devoted to it. The expectation of viewers to come to the series with a preexisting, considerable amount of knowledge about ancient Egypt is astonishing. Most people do not get Jesus right, but people are supposed to know who Taweret is? GTFOH. The voice acting for Ammit is the best performance in “Moon Knight,” and Saba Mubarak deserves some award, especially since she acts opposite Abraham, who is a bit of a scene stealer and theatrical ham—for the newbies, he played the antagonist protagonist in “Amadeus” (1984), and you should watch it if you have not. GOAT performance. Ammit was also the one god who looked and sounded like a goddess who wants to kill people before they did wrong, which explains her beef with Kohnshu, who wants to wait until they are naughty. Theoretically the stakes are high, and the world could end in a blood bath that would rival anything “Minority Report” (2002) threatens, but just don’t hold hands with anyone, and you will be fine. It feels a bit anticlimactic. The gods’ graphics were solid and seamless with the real world, but by the last episode, they felt like kaiju, which was not a bad thing, but perhaps could have made the show more interesting if dwelled upon earlier.
“Moon Knight” suffers a lot of narrative issues. It feels repetitive, and a post credit scene is inconsistent with a plot point in the fifth episode even though anyone could see it coming. Every scene feels as if it originated in another movie or television series: “Supernatural,” “Jurassic Park” (1993), the “Venom” franchise and “Buffy: The Vampire Slayer” to name a few. It could be a chicken and egg problem where the source material for MCU predates the references. Also, two different types of zombies in one episode are a bit much. The fights were solid when they were shown, which was too infrequent for my taste. Giving Marc and Steven different wardrobes as the titular hero was a terrific shorthand. Anton Mogart (Gaspard Ulliel), a person with issues against Leyla, appears in a single episode, which felt like a lot of build up for nothing.
If effects are too expensive, then make the stories more textured instead of monotonous. There are ways to world build without powers, and Marc and Steven’s story is so predictable that it does not offer enough narrative tension to keep the series grounded. Also though mentioned in the opening, “Moon Knight” seems completely separate from the rest of the MCU. It does not feel as if it is an integral building block to this mythology, and Phase 4 is an elusive concept with zero tangible meaning when applied to this project. I’d rather more time be spent on fleshing out the overarching story than pumping these projects out. If you love the cast and do not mind yet another split personality story, then it is worth it, but it is not must-see viewing. I almost forgot to keep watching it midway and ended up multitasking to get through it because the lure of cleaning suddenly was more riveting.
