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Blink. Did you miss it? The premiere of Pennyworth is just as quiet and reserved as it’s entrance into DC’s television universe.
It has been quite awhile since the Comic Book Syndicate took a deep dive into the world of comic book TV, but we are back at it, starting with DC Comics latest offering. To make sure we cover all of our basis we’ll lay out the basic plot of the episode, introduce or go over any new/old characters, make comparisons to the comics, and then end it off with a heaping dollop of opinion. Buckle up. Here we go.
PLOT
A war weary, twenty-something Alfred Pennyworth is not satisfied with expectations; he is tired of living under his father’s thumb and refuses to inherit the Pennyworth legacy of servitude that is working his way through a wealthy household to become a Butler. Instead, he opts for working nights as the door man for an alternative night club where he uses his position to network the name of ‘Pennyworth Security’ into the pockets of the elite that pass through.
‘Pennyworth Security’ happens to land in the pocket of a young American patron, a financial forensic analyst working in England, who we find out later is Thomas Wayne. Turns out Thomas has uncovered several levels of fraud on a scale not yet revealed to the audience. It is large enough however that he is being hunted by assassins who find the ‘Pennyworth Security’ business card in his pocket and, in an attempt to aid their manhunt, set up a kidnap scenario in order to force Alfred into bringing them Thomas Wayne.
REVIEW (& INTERESTING FACTS!)
Like most pilot episodes, this first chapter is a bit clunky, but it manages to overcome and survive. If you are looking for a convuluted origin story ripe with mystery and gaps to be filled in over later episodes, you are not going to get that here. DC The dialogue is believable, but the accents and in particular the embellishments, are very typical of an North American writers interpretation of the British-voice. There is plenty of “bloody”-this and “sodding”-that from the supporting cast of British thugs who, as it turns out, work for very high ranking officials making their wordplay jarring and seemingly out of place when their characters turn crass. Alfred’s character in particular will appease any Anglophile in his pointed use of slang, of note is his prediction of a potential situation as “going pear-shaped” and his assertion that French words absolutely be stricken from the conversation. Pip, pip!
Relative newcomer Jack Bannon plays the titular role of Alfred Pennyworth and is very well suited. Actor Bannon adopts a familiar accent to fans of Michael Caine’s Alfred, and his it is clear that his slow cockney accent is an auditory inspiration. It is by no means distracting, and helps to sort of ground and locate this whole endeavor in a Batman Universe that most viewers will be familiar with as, like modern interpretations of Gotham City, Pennyworth operates in a fictional version of England where there is no direct proclamation of the date or time period.
The Art direction plays a wonderful role of creating a rich environment for the story to take place. Alfred seems to reside in a Post-war industrial version of England, while Thomas Wayne’s office for example, is cluttered with remnants of Orientalism inspired interior architecture, separating the subject of the show from the ‘others’: Strewn about Wayne’s UK office, but not totally out of sight is some gorgeous mid-century Modern furniture (Sidebar: That orb-shaped lamp and his TWO credenzas!!! Hashtag, LIVING!) that set their two worlds apart.
Tie widths, collars, hairstyles, and makeup are accurate for the loose time period that the show is staged in, but the musical direction is interesting. Their choice in soundtracking parts of the show with popular music over a seemingly 40s-50s era period piece is reminiscent of Marvel Entertainment’s choices in some of their Phase 3 films, notably Thor: Ragnarok and Guardian’s of the Galaxy. While this tactic is distracting and entertaining for those big budget films, here it is subtle and wonderfully successful.
After much dwelling in the beauty of the show’s world building, it should be mentioned that this show is not without minor flaws and messy portions of the plot that could not be overlooked. In only the first hour-long episode, the decision to use a very long, kidnap-laden route to connect the Wayne family to Alfred Pennyworth is somewhat believable, a bit of a stretch (even by comic-logic standards), and in the end just mediocre. Initially it is never made clear who is not to be trusted, only who should be viewed as sinister: the instrumental play offs, the height of hair, and the willingness to wear fur helped draw those lines. It is also not immediately apparent which characters are connected to each other, however this is (very) slowly revealed as the episode unfolds. One thing that is very apparent however, is that they’re all motivated by Thomas Wayne. All the bad guys need to silence Wayne lest their indiscretions be revealed, except for the title character. Enter ‘Alfie’ who finds himself embroiled in this assassination plot simply because Wayne just happened to be causing a scene in a bar that Alfred works at. So, he ‘met a guy one time’ is good, but it’s not clever enough. After that it’s almost farcical how the rest of the action all unfolds. Despite the name of the show, the plot isn’t motivated by anything Alfred is doing, though we do manage to get a lot of character development for him which is lacking in some other comic-inspired shows. Aside from forcing Alfred’s character to be molded and moved through the criminal plot, the writing never goes overboard and is never totally outlandish. The show opted to keep it simple, which is it’s saving grace. I’m not totally hooked, I can’t wait to watch the next one!
RATING
3.5/5
You catch episodes of Pennyworth on SHOWCASE, premiering this Fall provided you have a subscription, but if you’re a chord cutter you can find it streaming online on Epix.com
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