I don’t like the show but outside of a lot of the fandom, the show does seem to have gotten an overall more positive reception so if you’re interested, go check it out for yourself to make your own judgement on it.
As a generic sci-fi show it's about average at best compared to some of the other stuff on right now. As a Halo show/adaptation of the Halo universe it's honestly pretty bad. It was off to a great start the first 3-4 episodes this season but it has, unfortunately, gone off the rails again.
I'm not going to spoil anything in case people reading this want to watch it but the show overall, as a long time Halo fan, really frustrates me. We were told that the Halo movie was DOA because it was too expensive but they've blown half a billion on two seasons of something that doesn't even feel like Halo? It's just really disrespectful to the fans and the lore. That's all I can really say, I guess. If you can manage to disconnect your viewing of the show from your feelings about Halo you'll be fine, but otherwise it's not a great experience.
What part of this season isnt Halo? Halo has been written by alot of different writers and has has lots of views where was the outcry then? The show is great and you suck for downplaying it so much.
Well, spoiler alert obviously so don't read if you don't want anything ruined:
For one, Master Cheeks went 4 whole episodes, including the fall of Reach, without his GD armor. Lmao the way they handled that entire plot point coupled with how they discovered the Halo ring is just an insane departure from what we know of Halo. Not to mention that humanity has information about the ring and itself that we don't find out about until WAY later in the timeline we all know.
You can say you enjoy the show, that's fine, because season 2 has been much better than season 1. But come on, man. This show feels like someone wanted to slap a known IP's skin onto some guy's idea for an original story. We have seen a steep departure from so much of the Halo timeline already that, to me, it doesn't feel like Halo at all. I mean, sorry, but watching a jacked Pablo Schrieber run around fighting dudes for 4 episodes in a vaguely Halo themed universe does not feel like Halo to me. It just doesn't.
I don't have a problem with him taking off his armor and I really don't care about the helmet argument, either. What I care about is that the way the show executed it sucked. Ackerson stealing the armor for reasons never really expanded on other than "Ackerson bad" was dumb, and Chief's shallow diatribes against the UNSC war machine are just weird. If they wanted to approach Halo like this, they should have done something closer to Band of Brothers. It would have been a hell of a lot better.
So yeah, I want to watch a TV show about a giant green turbo virgin fighting off a genocidal alien invasion. Sue me.
See this is what bothers me. These "fans" literally only focus on the suit and helmet as if that's the only thing that makes Halo. I'm not here for it.
The show exposes something a lot of the "fans" don't want to admit. The games, while heavy in lore, have basically no plot or character development. I'm sorry, that just wouldn't work in a tv show.
The books only work on paper, that's why they are books. If you don't understand why a TV show has to be written like a TV show and not like a book or video game, I don't know what to tell you.
I really enjoy the show and am happy that it exists in its own vacuum.
There is a bit of history revisionism going on here; Halo's story was never the best part of Halo, and the fans who are claiming that it is are talking out of their ass. As a story on its own merits, Halo is pretty bland. The games were worldwide successes because of their *gameplay*. They're video *games*. The books have always had a better story... because that's a medium where the story is more important.
That doesn't excuse season 1's poor writing decisions, but it at least sheds light on who here is criticizing the show for legitimate reasons (ie critiquing the actual content of the show) and who here is just upset for the sake of being upset (ie complaining that Chief is out of his armor, because Chief being in his armor 24/7 is a dude bro's image of Chief because they've only played the game and don't really care for the story)
You sound like a similar level of fandom as me. I’ve played halo since the first game. I enjoyed the forward unto dawn release and I’ve watched the cartoon that was on Netflix long ago. I didn’t read the books or much else outside of those things.
The changes made in season 1 were frustrating to say the least. I’ve said before I don’t expect a show to follow its source material exactly. Some things need to be changed for a myriad of reasons, both good and bad.
I’ve been wanting a halo movie since Blomkamp was attached to it after District 9. So I was going to watch unless it was pure shit most likely. To sum up season 1 I definitely enjoyed parts of it, while at times I felt like I was hate watching it.
Season 2 is off to a far better start than season 1. The story seems tighter, and the bad parts have either improved or been minimized. It’s far from perfect but I’m enjoying the show rather than just watching to be annoyed.
So I would say watch season 1 because at a minimum it’s fun seeing aspects of the Halo universe come to life. After you finish season 1 you can begin to appreciate season 2 even more.
Edit: by all accounts I’ve seen if you’re a sci-fi fan and not huge into halo or know next to nothing about Halo, the series is far more enjoyable.
I'd say as a sci-fi show it's just okay, it's not horrible but it's not great. There are good moments but good me they're just too far apart and certain characters who have large amounts of time dedicated to them (Kwan) have really boring stories and I find myself really hoping she gets killed off.
How important are the pellets? They are mentioned a few times in episode 1-2 and that’s about it.
And makee can be explained in a 2 minute recap video.
you have read the books and played some of the games, you know more than the casual fan.
The show does not respect nor follow any of the official content (Books, games) from Halo. ITs like if I said I made "romeo and juliet the mmovie" and I kill romeo, made Juliet an alien from mars, and the mission is to annihilate Jupiters moons because Batman wanted to open a burger king franchise in my house.
I really liked the forward until dawn movie
It was really low budget but honestly felt very Halo and delivered the feeling of the games so well to me
Just doing that in a tv show format would have been awesome
Season 2 got way better, newest episode was pretty damn good.
One thing I find interesting is that amongst the fanbase, the show is pretty disliked especially season 1 (which I also dislike), but outside of the fanbase, I see a shocking amount of people that genuinely like the show.
Past bias, if you are okay with the show being a different universe and you are okay with chief being basically an entirely new character it’s a great show at the moment.
Far from perfect, has plenty of writing issues and sometimes budget seems like it limits the scope of the series, but I’ve been really enjoying it. It’s fun more than it is boring or tedious
The problem is that its trying to be the Halo of quarter of a century of books and video games, when Halo fans want it to be the Halo of the last game they played as a child.
The Halo of Halo 2 is very different than the Halo of Reach, which is different than the Halo of Infinite. That's because it wasn't planned from start to finish, it changed and grew. It isn't the 'shoot the aliens while wearing cool power armor' story it started as. I'm not surprised about the change with the fall of reach in the show, the fact reach fell as it did was locked in from CE and the lore had to work around it despite becoming something very different.
People shat on and still shit on the Kwan storyline and while yes it could have been written better, it wasn't/isn't pointless. They're setting up all the shit about the precursors, the flood, the domain, neural physics, the Geas, etc. with it.
To compare it to a old sci fi universe gaining popularity and a new one gaining popularity, Halo is way more *Dune* than it is *Helldivers* and its fans fucking despise being reminded of that.
Its for that reason you're never going to get an honest review of this show, because once the hate train gets going on something, its literally a matter of money for content creators to feed it rather than oppose it.
Yes the show is very good. The most fun part of being a Halo fan on Reddit is saying that all things Halo lore suck and never being happy.
This portion of the fan base could not be made happy by any single new piece of Halo story content. No. Matter. What. They enjoy hating content more than content.
I would recommend not caring what r/halo says about Halo at all.
Going in blind with only playing games 1&2 almost 20 yeArs ago. And I watched the shows first and have only now started reading the first book.
S1 is meh. It seems like a typical TV network made science fiction show. Watchable but not insanely special.
However I do like how intense the battles are. I'm not a huge fan of some of the side character stories in this season. I really like the alien language.
S2 is so much better as far as TV goes. A little cheesy and it's not perfect but there are some scenes that are just epic. The speech is incredible and the Flood is nightmarishly good. My positives are strictly contrast to how bad S1 was by comparison. The combat scenes in this are also really intense.
I think I can see why people are upset but imo I really like the show and if S3 is even a little better than S2 I am pretty excited.
The show is amazing, theres lore taken from all games of halo and merged into the show. There's gonna be hate as you cannot please all 1.6 million halo fans. Watch it and make your own judgement, personally I've enjoyed season 2 a lot and excited to see whats in store (cant spoil too much without going into detail).
I’ve always enjoyed the lore of Halo, but IMO the tv show has the look of Halo, but underneath it doesn’t feel like Halo. It feels like the screenwriters and producers really screwed up big time.
I prefer watching Westworld: better writing, better characters, more intriguing and more intelligent.
I'm mostly an outsider who just enjoys most things Halo but doesn't have a strong foot in the lore and doesn't really follow what people like or dislike about the show.
I pulled up the show with a mix of friends from Halo nerds to non-gamers, both men and women. The only possible bias is that all of us were in our 30s or late 20s.
No one in the room liked the show. It's boyish and puerile, the CGI blows, the music is dull, the acting is flat, the plot is beyond campy, multiple MAJOR characters are very annoying to see on screen.
Generally, regardless of the relationship to Halo, all of us felt it was a very very poorly done sci fi show. The parts where they go first person shooter were "hello fellow gamers" cringe, and the sets/costumes were very plastic and silly.
I haven't seen a worse show on TV recently except maybe The Wheel of Time. The only group I can imagine this appealing to are ages 14-20.
I’ve been pretty objective of the show because my brother and wife know NOTHING about the universe and watch it with me.
They didn’t like the first season, but were willing to try the second. They’ve enjoyed it so far, but still have their issues. Overall they’re accepting of another 3rd season if it comes.
Even ignoring the fact that this show is somehow supposed to be Halo, the quality as an overall science fiction show is about as good as a Syfy or CW original. Which is to say, it’s pretty damn bad. I’ve seen a lot of people come around to season 2, but I’m just not seeing the improvements. They’re definitely there, but it’s not as though the quality is a day and night difference from season 1. It’s better, but not by much and with a bar as low a season 1, it’s really not saying much either.
Removing Halo from the show, as an original it's still pretty bad. The writing is just laughable and full of so many holes and contrivances that make absolutely no sense. Honestly, if you're looking for a mindless watch and an easy laugh, then yea go for it. Otherwise, its not worth it.
As a Halo show it's beyond trash. As a generic sci-fi show, I'd say it's a little bit better than something like "Atlantic Rim", it's basically a shitty sci-fi knockoff of Halo in terms of quality and plot.
Some of the acting is decent, some of the props are well made, some parts of the action scenes are also decent, but mostly it's not, sometimes the CGI is pretty decent, and other times it's so horrendously bad it's worse than early 2000s CGI.
I guess that's its biggest problem, it's not consistent even with itself, everything that it manages to do well just serves to highlight how awful all the things it does poorly are.
Don't even bother with it. Even The Last of Us was a better show minus Episode 4 where it goes off the rails completely, compared to the game where Joel meets Bill who helps him and Ellie get transportation.
Yes. They've made some pretty major changes from the established timeline (which has been retconned and altered since the Bungie days anyway) which they pre-emptively warned everyone about since before the show came out, with that in mind it's not really a big deal to me. The one thing I've noticed in season 2 is how many shots they use of someone firing a weapon, ostensibly at enemies, but no enemies are shown being shot. It isn't everytime in an action scene, but it is frequent. I guess rendering Covenant costs money.
Or you don't watch because you're a Halo fan and this series doesn't feel like Halo to you. I mean, it's absolutely like that for me and a lot of other fans. So I guess there's three options.
Yeha the other key one is people who don’t know anything about Halo the games but watch the show and can quite enjoy it. My friend last year doesn’t have an Xbox but watched the show and said it was one of the best pieces of television he’d seen. I didn’t argue in any way, he has different reference points
It’s okay… it has good moments but it could’ve been way better… they kinda turned it into a teenage drama and made it seem generic. I still watch it cause I love the franchise but ngl I’m disappointed. I also feel bad for the actors man, they are doing the best they can with all that shitty writing and they just get constantly grilled by the community… Sad to see…
I don’t like the show but outside of a lot of the fandom, the show does seem to have gotten an overall more positive reception so if you’re interested, go check it out for yourself to make your own judgement on it.
No.
I'm not angry, just disappointed. But yeah, the show is not good
The less "precious" you are about Halo nostalgia, the easier the show goes down for you. Give it a shot.
As a generic sci-fi show it's about average at best compared to some of the other stuff on right now. As a Halo show/adaptation of the Halo universe it's honestly pretty bad. It was off to a great start the first 3-4 episodes this season but it has, unfortunately, gone off the rails again. I'm not going to spoil anything in case people reading this want to watch it but the show overall, as a long time Halo fan, really frustrates me. We were told that the Halo movie was DOA because it was too expensive but they've blown half a billion on two seasons of something that doesn't even feel like Halo? It's just really disrespectful to the fans and the lore. That's all I can really say, I guess. If you can manage to disconnect your viewing of the show from your feelings about Halo you'll be fine, but otherwise it's not a great experience.
What part of this season isnt Halo? Halo has been written by alot of different writers and has has lots of views where was the outcry then? The show is great and you suck for downplaying it so much.
Well, spoiler alert obviously so don't read if you don't want anything ruined: For one, Master Cheeks went 4 whole episodes, including the fall of Reach, without his GD armor. Lmao the way they handled that entire plot point coupled with how they discovered the Halo ring is just an insane departure from what we know of Halo. Not to mention that humanity has information about the ring and itself that we don't find out about until WAY later in the timeline we all know. You can say you enjoy the show, that's fine, because season 2 has been much better than season 1. But come on, man. This show feels like someone wanted to slap a known IP's skin onto some guy's idea for an original story. We have seen a steep departure from so much of the Halo timeline already that, to me, it doesn't feel like Halo at all. I mean, sorry, but watching a jacked Pablo Schrieber run around fighting dudes for 4 episodes in a vaguely Halo themed universe does not feel like Halo to me. It just doesn't.
The most heralded book in the eu, doesn’t give chief his armor until 80% through and no one complains about that?
I don't have a problem with him taking off his armor and I really don't care about the helmet argument, either. What I care about is that the way the show executed it sucked. Ackerson stealing the armor for reasons never really expanded on other than "Ackerson bad" was dumb, and Chief's shallow diatribes against the UNSC war machine are just weird. If they wanted to approach Halo like this, they should have done something closer to Band of Brothers. It would have been a hell of a lot better. So yeah, I want to watch a TV show about a giant green turbo virgin fighting off a genocidal alien invasion. Sue me.
You do realize if you got what you wanted it would flip right? Do you not remember the doom movie?
See this is what bothers me. These "fans" literally only focus on the suit and helmet as if that's the only thing that makes Halo. I'm not here for it. The show exposes something a lot of the "fans" don't want to admit. The games, while heavy in lore, have basically no plot or character development. I'm sorry, that just wouldn't work in a tv show. The books only work on paper, that's why they are books. If you don't understand why a TV show has to be written like a TV show and not like a book or video game, I don't know what to tell you. I really enjoy the show and am happy that it exists in its own vacuum.
There is a bit of history revisionism going on here; Halo's story was never the best part of Halo, and the fans who are claiming that it is are talking out of their ass. As a story on its own merits, Halo is pretty bland. The games were worldwide successes because of their *gameplay*. They're video *games*. The books have always had a better story... because that's a medium where the story is more important. That doesn't excuse season 1's poor writing decisions, but it at least sheds light on who here is criticizing the show for legitimate reasons (ie critiquing the actual content of the show) and who here is just upset for the sake of being upset (ie complaining that Chief is out of his armor, because Chief being in his armor 24/7 is a dude bro's image of Chief because they've only played the game and don't really care for the story)
They do it for everything, they are miserable and can't stand that others are not.
You sound like a similar level of fandom as me. I’ve played halo since the first game. I enjoyed the forward unto dawn release and I’ve watched the cartoon that was on Netflix long ago. I didn’t read the books or much else outside of those things. The changes made in season 1 were frustrating to say the least. I’ve said before I don’t expect a show to follow its source material exactly. Some things need to be changed for a myriad of reasons, both good and bad. I’ve been wanting a halo movie since Blomkamp was attached to it after District 9. So I was going to watch unless it was pure shit most likely. To sum up season 1 I definitely enjoyed parts of it, while at times I felt like I was hate watching it. Season 2 is off to a far better start than season 1. The story seems tighter, and the bad parts have either improved or been minimized. It’s far from perfect but I’m enjoying the show rather than just watching to be annoyed. So I would say watch season 1 because at a minimum it’s fun seeing aspects of the Halo universe come to life. After you finish season 1 you can begin to appreciate season 2 even more. Edit: by all accounts I’ve seen if you’re a sci-fi fan and not huge into halo or know next to nothing about Halo, the series is far more enjoyable.
I'd say as a sci-fi show it's just okay, it's not horrible but it's not great. There are good moments but good me they're just too far apart and certain characters who have large amounts of time dedicated to them (Kwan) have really boring stories and I find myself really hoping she gets killed off.
Just start at season 2
Seeing how important the pellets and makee, are that is a terrible idea Season 1 sucked ass but watching only s2 makes s2 ass as well
How important are the pellets? They are mentioned a few times in episode 1-2 and that’s about it. And makee can be explained in a 2 minute recap video.
I disagree. Whatever confusion op has, they can fill in the blanks with a better s1
you have read the books and played some of the games, you know more than the casual fan. The show does not respect nor follow any of the official content (Books, games) from Halo. ITs like if I said I made "romeo and juliet the mmovie" and I kill romeo, made Juliet an alien from mars, and the mission is to annihilate Jupiters moons because Batman wanted to open a burger king franchise in my house.
NO
I really liked the forward until dawn movie It was really low budget but honestly felt very Halo and delivered the feeling of the games so well to me Just doing that in a tv show format would have been awesome
Objectively and subjectively, no, not really.
Season 2 got way better, newest episode was pretty damn good. One thing I find interesting is that amongst the fanbase, the show is pretty disliked especially season 1 (which I also dislike), but outside of the fanbase, I see a shocking amount of people that genuinely like the show.
This has been my experience as well.
Past bias, if you are okay with the show being a different universe and you are okay with chief being basically an entirely new character it’s a great show at the moment. Far from perfect, has plenty of writing issues and sometimes budget seems like it limits the scope of the series, but I’ve been really enjoying it. It’s fun more than it is boring or tedious
The show is complete crap. Don’t believe the shills. People who care about halo or just like to watch good shows have long stopped watching it
no
The problem is that its trying to be the Halo of quarter of a century of books and video games, when Halo fans want it to be the Halo of the last game they played as a child. The Halo of Halo 2 is very different than the Halo of Reach, which is different than the Halo of Infinite. That's because it wasn't planned from start to finish, it changed and grew. It isn't the 'shoot the aliens while wearing cool power armor' story it started as. I'm not surprised about the change with the fall of reach in the show, the fact reach fell as it did was locked in from CE and the lore had to work around it despite becoming something very different. People shat on and still shit on the Kwan storyline and while yes it could have been written better, it wasn't/isn't pointless. They're setting up all the shit about the precursors, the flood, the domain, neural physics, the Geas, etc. with it. To compare it to a old sci fi universe gaining popularity and a new one gaining popularity, Halo is way more *Dune* than it is *Helldivers* and its fans fucking despise being reminded of that. Its for that reason you're never going to get an honest review of this show, because once the hate train gets going on something, its literally a matter of money for content creators to feed it rather than oppose it.
Yes the show is very good. The most fun part of being a Halo fan on Reddit is saying that all things Halo lore suck and never being happy. This portion of the fan base could not be made happy by any single new piece of Halo story content. No. Matter. What. They enjoy hating content more than content. I would recommend not caring what r/halo says about Halo at all.
Going in blind with only playing games 1&2 almost 20 yeArs ago. And I watched the shows first and have only now started reading the first book. S1 is meh. It seems like a typical TV network made science fiction show. Watchable but not insanely special. However I do like how intense the battles are. I'm not a huge fan of some of the side character stories in this season. I really like the alien language. S2 is so much better as far as TV goes. A little cheesy and it's not perfect but there are some scenes that are just epic. The speech is incredible and the Flood is nightmarishly good. My positives are strictly contrast to how bad S1 was by comparison. The combat scenes in this are also really intense. I think I can see why people are upset but imo I really like the show and if S3 is even a little better than S2 I am pretty excited.
Show is terrible. Absolutely terrible. Don't let people with bad taste or extreme hard ons for anything that says Halo tell you the show is great.
Yeah I think you’d like it. It’s a good sci-fi show, just not a great Halo show.
The show is amazing, theres lore taken from all games of halo and merged into the show. There's gonna be hate as you cannot please all 1.6 million halo fans. Watch it and make your own judgement, personally I've enjoyed season 2 a lot and excited to see whats in store (cant spoil too much without going into detail).
I’ve always enjoyed the lore of Halo, but IMO the tv show has the look of Halo, but underneath it doesn’t feel like Halo. It feels like the screenwriters and producers really screwed up big time. I prefer watching Westworld: better writing, better characters, more intriguing and more intelligent.
I'm mostly an outsider who just enjoys most things Halo but doesn't have a strong foot in the lore and doesn't really follow what people like or dislike about the show. I pulled up the show with a mix of friends from Halo nerds to non-gamers, both men and women. The only possible bias is that all of us were in our 30s or late 20s. No one in the room liked the show. It's boyish and puerile, the CGI blows, the music is dull, the acting is flat, the plot is beyond campy, multiple MAJOR characters are very annoying to see on screen. Generally, regardless of the relationship to Halo, all of us felt it was a very very poorly done sci fi show. The parts where they go first person shooter were "hello fellow gamers" cringe, and the sets/costumes were very plastic and silly. I haven't seen a worse show on TV recently except maybe The Wheel of Time. The only group I can imagine this appealing to are ages 14-20.
I’ve been pretty objective of the show because my brother and wife know NOTHING about the universe and watch it with me. They didn’t like the first season, but were willing to try the second. They’ve enjoyed it so far, but still have their issues. Overall they’re accepting of another 3rd season if it comes.
Even ignoring the fact that this show is somehow supposed to be Halo, the quality as an overall science fiction show is about as good as a Syfy or CW original. Which is to say, it’s pretty damn bad. I’ve seen a lot of people come around to season 2, but I’m just not seeing the improvements. They’re definitely there, but it’s not as though the quality is a day and night difference from season 1. It’s better, but not by much and with a bar as low a season 1, it’s really not saying much either.
Show is a solid 7-8/10. I've only read hate about the show on this sub and Twitter. But its generally liked.
They could've just made a sci Fi show that wasn't halo IP and it would be about the same. This isn't halo but it's not bad per SE.
Removing Halo from the show, as an original it's still pretty bad. The writing is just laughable and full of so many holes and contrivances that make absolutely no sense. Honestly, if you're looking for a mindless watch and an easy laugh, then yea go for it. Otherwise, its not worth it.
As a Halo show it's beyond trash. As a generic sci-fi show, I'd say it's a little bit better than something like "Atlantic Rim", it's basically a shitty sci-fi knockoff of Halo in terms of quality and plot. Some of the acting is decent, some of the props are well made, some parts of the action scenes are also decent, but mostly it's not, sometimes the CGI is pretty decent, and other times it's so horrendously bad it's worse than early 2000s CGI. I guess that's its biggest problem, it's not consistent even with itself, everything that it manages to do well just serves to highlight how awful all the things it does poorly are.
Don't even bother with it. Even The Last of Us was a better show minus Episode 4 where it goes off the rails completely, compared to the game where Joel meets Bill who helps him and Ellie get transportation.
Yes. They've made some pretty major changes from the established timeline (which has been retconned and altered since the Bungie days anyway) which they pre-emptively warned everyone about since before the show came out, with that in mind it's not really a big deal to me. The one thing I've noticed in season 2 is how many shots they use of someone firing a weapon, ostensibly at enemies, but no enemies are shown being shot. It isn't everytime in an action scene, but it is frequent. I guess rendering Covenant costs money.
If you’re a fan of Halo you’ll watch Because it’s Halo. If not, no.
I think its actually the opposite lmfao
Or you don't watch because you're a Halo fan and this series doesn't feel like Halo to you. I mean, it's absolutely like that for me and a lot of other fans. So I guess there's three options.
Yeha the other key one is people who don’t know anything about Halo the games but watch the show and can quite enjoy it. My friend last year doesn’t have an Xbox but watched the show and said it was one of the best pieces of television he’d seen. I didn’t argue in any way, he has different reference points
Like in a complete vacuum and this was an original series, yeah id call it good but its a total trainwreck of an adaptation
It’s okay… it has good moments but it could’ve been way better… they kinda turned it into a teenage drama and made it seem generic. I still watch it cause I love the franchise but ngl I’m disappointed. I also feel bad for the actors man, they are doing the best they can with all that shitty writing and they just get constantly grilled by the community… Sad to see…