My mom says Summer shows are ones the producers don’t think will go over well so they get them out of the way in Summer and launch major shows in the fall.

If that’s the case I understand better why Marvel launched a show about virtually unheard of teen heroes this year, but I thought it looked kind of cool notwithstanding. I wan’t concerned about it being smaller scale, honestly I thought Marvel could use a welcome dose of moderation…unfortunately I did not get that with this show.

If you happen to have heard of it and been curious, I can tell you all you need to know about it to decide not to watch it.

I can’t really list any positives with this show other than the main characters are good actors, and the special effects on on par with Marvel’s other movies, there was one episode that was truly good, number seven, it’s the only one I could recommend. But you’d not understand it without seeing the previous ones, and they are not worth it.

In addition to the standard creepy voodoo and unnecessary sex scenes, this show features one of the worst characters ever: Tandi. The girl lead.

Oh my gosh, Tandi is the worst.  She makes Deadpool look like someone with moral consistency.

Throughout the course of the season Tandi establishes herself as a gifted liar, a thief who drugs rich kids after faking going to have sex with them and then takes their valuables, a drug addict who hates her mom’s boyfriend, and a homeless girl with suicidal thoughts.

If that wasn’t enough to make you dislike her, she constantly lies to and manipulates Tyrone, her only friend, who she met by scamming anyway. Tyrone actually cares about her, but with seemingly no concern and some apparent satisfaction Tandi steals from him and hi parents after faking coming over out of concern for him on the anniversary of his brother’s death. She doesn’t bother to return the stuff after she’s done using it for an investigation, and Tyrone remains blissfully unaware of it. Poor fellow.

Tandi is a selfish jerk and no mistake. Tyrone can always rely on her to fail him when he needs her most. She’ll make the selfish choice and then run from the consequences. She has the gall to chew him out for his own issues, and her apology later seems to be just to get him to do as she wants.

To make matters worse, for whatever bizarre reason, Tandi is one of the two chosen to protect the world with her gift, a shimmering dagger and the ability to touch people and see their hopes. You’d think this would give her sympathy for people, but she uses this gift for her own purposes to try to find whoever was responsible for destroying her dad’s good name. (Tandi’s life being defined by losing her father in a tragic accident.) She sees all sorts of people’s hopes, some of them quite repulsive I might add, and takes a kind of sick delight in being able to intrude.

When Tyrone suggest that that might be crossing a line Tandi responds with “The world has been stealing from me my whole life, it’s time I stole some of it back.”

At this point I wanted to slap her. “Oh yeah Tandi, you have a house, you had a boyfriend before you ditched him, you had a car, you have food, and if you had wanted you could’ve earned your way through school because anyone with your skill at lying to people to get hired could get a freaking job! But no, you’ve lived by drugging and stealing from people who never did zip to you! And the world has stolen form you!? Get over yourself!”

Seriously, her dad’s death was an accident and was partly his own fault anyway, people survive worse tragedies without becoming psychos. As Tryone points out “Would your dad be proud of what his little girl has become?”

To top it all off, Tandi finds out her dad sometimes smacked her mom around, and immediately decides to forget about clearing his name and to cease to believe in him and to feel justified in being selfish because clearly she can’t trust anyone.

Talk about a victim mentality.

Tyrone is a lot more likable. He does kind things and is a better friend to Tandi than she’s ever been to anyone. He’s the real hero of the show, and sadly if you’re familiar with his comic story, he’s actually stuck with an instability due to his power that would make him go to the dark side if it wasn’t for Tandi’s power counterbalancing. Gee, wouldn’t it be nice if she was the type of person I could picture caring about him.

Now, the show really wants you to believe that there’s more to Tandi than meets the eye, even after she’s repeatedly proven that she’s a terrible person, but it has other problems. The overall tone of the show is way darker than most of Marvel material, and that’s with a lower body count. It has this theme of hopelessness, and nobody on it really being truly good, though Tyrone does come through most often. But from cops to parents, the show screws everyone’s rose colored image of the people in their life, and for what reason we don’t know. the show just believes people are incurably evil.

Which as someone who believes in original sin, I might have to agree with. Without God and love, people are incurably selfish. But people still have goodness int hem, and when any show or movie is determined to erase all traces of that by giving everyone a Freudian selfish reason for whatever they do, I question whether it’s really trying to be about heroes.

This show seems to be cash-grabbing by using Marvel’s name as an excuse to let their own sick minds run wile. Because who the heck comes up with stuff like this unless their own world view is skewed?

Now, you may wonder, would someone who likes darker stuff like this show?

No. Unless your really really like dark stuff. Even if you’re a fan of evil characters, this show would not satisfy you; if you like antiheroes, it won’t satisfy; and if you like heroes, you definitely won’t be satisfied.

I’m serious, it’s not even worth it to make fun of it. Just avoid this show, it deserve to go under, but I do with Tyrone’s actor the best of luck making it into an actual Marvel movie.

Until next time–Natasha.