Supacell premieres on Netflix Thursday, June 27.
In the previous decade and a half, the sci-fi style has produced a slew of TV exhibits and movies wealthy with social commentary that get to the center of the longstanding anxieties and tribulations of the Black expertise. Netflix’s gritty new drama Supacell initially looks like the newest addition to this pantheon, however after 4 of its six episodes, the collection buckles beneath the load of its personal ambition.
Created by British MC Rapman, Supacell follows South Londoners Michael, Tazer, Sabrina, Andre, and Rodney, who all of the sudden achieve superpowers. Getting a deal with on their newfound powers isn’t a fix-it-by-morning downside: Looming within the background of Supacell is each a conspiracy to imprison the Black individuals who’ve acquired these extraordinary talents and a time-travel plot involving a portal-hopping villain and the prevention of a pending disaster. Despite its fantastical material, Supacell properly depicts its protagonists as on a regular basis of us struggling to make ends meet. This isn’t simply an origin story about how the quintet’s newfound items can come in useful. It additionally underscores how tremendous power, pace, or telekinesis could be simply one other factor to fret about whereas being Black.
If this appears like so much for a present to undertake in six hour-long episodes, it’s. What’s worse is that the climactic battle the collection is constructing towards is not as alluring because the groundwork the present lays with its low-stakes character writing. In a vacuum, every character’s journey is sort of a mini-anthology unto itself. Witnessing their hardships enhance or worsen as a result of their powers offers the present’s commentary on systemic racism’s affect on Black of us – superpowered or in any other case – legs to stroll on. But its steps turn out to be wobbly with the incessant reminder that, someday sooner or later, Michael and crew will likely be shrouded in matching black outfits, preventing an equally cartoonish-looking villain in a kaleidoscope of tough particular results.
It’s an earnest present that is overly bold in its scope. The methods the characters alter to their powers are weirdly genuine and matter-of-fact: Weed supplier Rodney utilizing his speedster abilities to outsell the competitors is so galaxy-brained that it is impressed. It additionally doesn’t damage that the preliminary glimpses of powers are temporary sufficient that they’ll’t be dissected for his or her visible shortcomings. The identical can’t be stated for a way Supacell’s flashforward embarrassingly presents its characters appearing out their heroic feats in entrance of a inexperienced display screen. While cliché at first blush, the interpersonal drama of its heroes – which sees them battle with a pending engagement, gang violence, infidelity, drug trafficking, and job safety – is engrossing, particularly when superpowers get thrown into the combo. Turns out telekinesis pays dividends when it is advisable to throw your dishonest accomplice to the curb. When the characters’ storylines intersect, it’s like watching puzzle items tuck neatly into place.
The identical can’t be stated about how Supacell’s dash towards the long run instantly makes the tensions of these storylines really feel moot. While these sequences function a tease for issues to return, they’re so starkly divorced from the story at hand that it spoils the catharsis of characters overcoming their particular person hardships. This is made all of the extra grating by the present’s resolution to have Michael – the group’s Professor Xavier – undermine his fellow heroes to serve his personal goals. The result’s a present the place the journey is extra worthwhile than its vacation spot.
Supacell doesn’t assist itself by routinely drawing parallels to different superhero tales. We don’t need to level out that the flashforward materials is a hybrid of Avengers: Endgame and Flashpoint – the characters may do it for you, contemplating how typically they examine their very own dilemmas to these of DC and Marvel heroes. There’s room for comparability on the subject of manufacturing values, although: Supacell’s particular results oscillate between CW high quality and visuals straight out of an early season of The Witcher.
Underneath these grandiose shifting items is a good story that encourages viewers to ponder the insidious, widespread nature of institutionalized racism in the true world. Unfortunately, Supacell’s thematic throughline offers approach half approach by means of its fourth episode, changing into mere taste textual content for a middling superhero collection that relinquishes its focus for the promise of a grand spectacle with no tooth or function.
