“Twisted Metal” (PeacockTV) S1 Review by Rafy Mediavilla (@RMediavilla) #TwistedMetal
Twisted Metal is a half-hour live-action TV series based on the classic PlayStation game series, is a high-octane action comedy about a motor-mouthed outsider offered a chance at a better life, but only if he can successfully deliver a mysterious package across a post-apocalyptic wasteland. With the help of a badass axe-wielding car thief, he’ll face savage marauders driving vehicles of destruction and other dangers of the open road, including a deranged clown who drives an all too familiar ice cream truck. Season 1 follows a motor-mouthed outsider offered a chance at a better life, but only if he can successfully deliver a mysterious package across a post-apocalyptic wasteland.
While I truly don’t consider myself a gamer but as someone that grew up playing Super Mario on the Nintendo Entertainment System the second the Playstation came out I knew I need to have a while mostly to play Crash Bandicoot, yet when Twisted Metal came out I was instantly hooked with the concept of crazy car crash fight and the lore behind it all. This meant that once Twist Metal was announced as a series coming to Peacock it automatically made it to my must-watch list for this year, and I am extremely happy to report that the series does not disappoint and it delivers big in every way possible,
Story-wise season 1 mostly serves as an introduction ot the characters and the craziness behind it all. The true story behind the video game as a whole does not get mentioned till the final episode. I have to mention that at the beginning of the review, anyone that is a true hardcore fan of video games lowers and little their expectation of the series going full-blown Twisted Metal from start to finish. With that out of the way, I believe the writers and producers of the show did a superb job of basically giving faces to the cars as we know them in the video games. While Sweet Tooth is the most notable face that we see in the trailers as seen in the video games, Anthony Mackie’s Milk Man character, and every other character we meed during this season 1 introduction course to Twisted Metal somewhat resemble the characters of the cars as we see them of the video game. The action-packed scenes are there, and all are very entertaining and fun to watch. If anything times the dark comedy does land, but it is a minor issue I can overlook because of how fun this story develops.
Performance wise Will Arnet provides the voice of Sweet Tooth and pro wrestler Samoa Joe proving the menacing physical look of the character are the clear standouts of the series. Anthony Mackie as the Milk Man a.k.a. John Doe and Stephanie Beatriz as Slient carry most of the story and maybe times their chemistry was superb, once again the comedic spots don’t land that well. It was fun to see Thomas Haden Church as the over-centric cop Agent Stone’s backstory is good while a little underdeveloped. Again the characters are fun but their story lacks dept as the writers and producers needed to balance their development vs bring the heat with action scenes, as we clearly see the shiting in gears in the second half of the season.
Season 1 works great as an introduction, story-wise not everything landed but the core essence of Twisted Metal between the characters and the action scenes is fully present. While do believe Season 2 will be a hell of a lot better, season 1 gets the job done at being fun and entertaining.
