Welcome to "What I Learned," a blog about reading that has helped my writing that Conor Gallagher has wroten. There might be spoilers, but I'll let you know!
Today, we're learning from Into the Badlands.
And I know what you're thinking. First, because you're speaking out loud and I'm standing right behind you and second, because it makes sense. "Conor!" you say as if I'm about to drive us into a ravine, me the obvious Thelma to your Louise. "I thought this blog was about books!"
And it is. But I watched all of this TV show and I liked it and learned from it and it's important to grow and to let people grow, dag-nabbit. But anyway, beware of spoilers cause the show's over and we're gonna have to talk about the whole thing to get the picture.
A fun thing about that photo? The majority of the characters pictured are dead. Which leads us to the lesson. But first, a quick recap in case you haven't taken the time.
Into the Badlands was a show all about a world without guns, with Barons and within which most everyone knows advanced martial arts. See ‘One Final Dumb Opinion’ below for more about that last thing.
In some time in the future—long enough that there’s no cities, very few cars, scarce electricity and radioactive demon children running around (that actually makes a little sense, I promise)—the land that the United States previously occupied is now controlled by Barons. Ruthless people each in charge of one major resource (slaves and opium to name two), the Barons wallow in a blood-earned peace. Though from what we’re able to gather in the 3 seasons and just 32 episodes, they all kind of want to rule everything and are okay to shed a bit more blood to do it.
There’s our main protagonists who are constantly fighting their urges to solve every problem through violence. Our young heros trying to earn their stripes, find their way in the world and also maybe love…Oh wait, nope. Tilda just snapped someone’s neck. That was meant to be a little joke, but that’s actually a pretty good logline for the series. “Oh wait, nope. They’re dead.”
In the first season, we meet Sunny—the most dangerous killer (aka Clipper) in the Badlands—and follow him on his journey to find a way out of the dangerous and blood-thirsty territory with his wife, the gentle healer Veil, and his protégé, the eager (and traumatized but also a bit of a dick) MK.
Things go to shit, tons of people die and basically everyone else is captured.
Season Two picks up a bit later with Sonny outside the Badlands. Everyone tries to escape their captors. More power struggles ensue. Allegiances change. We meet one of the best characters, Nathanial Moon.
Things go to poo and tons of people die. But this time, it’s series regulars and just MK is captured.
Final season (which I don’t think was the plan for the creators), war is brewing betwixt two Barons while invaders/religious zealots come to the Badlands to usher in a new world. They’re all interesting and cool.
Things do to doo-dee. Tons of people die, and this time, the show is cancelled. I suppose, technically, everyone's paycheck was...captured? Listen, I'm sad the show got cancelled.
That’s the gist. And while it does not do the show justice in the least, it is helpful for my point.
Before we grow out, we gotta dig.
Be a tree, if you will. Cause, like, roots.
The first season, we’re thrown into this crazy world where everyone is on X-games mode. Little girls have butterfly shaped throwing stars and all the Barons, though occupying a wasteland, take the time to have a coordinated color palette across their forces and homes. J'door.
In these six brief episodes, we learn a bit about the world. The hierarchical structure. Cogs, Clippers, Barrons, Dolls, Nomads, Totemists. All these words start to mean other things, and more impressively, they start to make real sense in your head.
For example, a Clipper is a soldier/assassin. When they kill someone, they clip them. First time you hear it: "Huh?" Third or fourth: "Yeah, I guess. Makes sense. Cut hair. Cut throat. Death come." Trust me. It happens.
And it happens because we're digging in. We slithering down into the apparently formerly poisoned earth? There's never a TON of info on what the fall of the Old World actually looked like, but they can grow plants, so. My theory is that everyone and everything is super duper irradiated because the little scanner things to find the Demon Kids (TM) are just Geiger counters made by steampunk artisans.
And all of that is fine. It's swell. We're getting IN to the Badlands. But then season 2 comes. And Sunny—our main character—is out of the Badlands. So is MK. So is this new character name Bajie who is inexplicably played by Nick Frost. And yes, the world opens up and it's big and sad and grey and scary, but is it necessary?
The third season continues this trend but at an even grander scale, introducing us to multiple new towns, settlements, powerful organizations, our first big city and a whole new family of main characters we—to the writer's credit—are immediately able to care about but also, WHAT IN THE BLAZES? A whole secret organization was shown in the last, like, five episodes and then also disbanded?
TL;DR: Why so much? Why so fast?
My above summaries are just the tippy-tip of the actual iceberg they visit in one episode before being back down by green valleys the next. But for real, it feels to me like they jumped the shark over a bunch of other sharks they already had.
This raises several questions in my mind:
Did they know they were getting canceled and really wanted to answer some burning questions?
Perhaps, but then why did they not answer those questions?
Were they running out of ideas for the characters they had?
Okay, sure, happens all the time. But, but...there's still so many questions, why don't we...
And that's that confusing part and where the lesson lives. It's a question really: Have I answered enough to show you more?
I think sometimes the answer can be "No," and you can still keep going. For example, from Season One to Two, tons of questions, but I was like, sure. Show me the rest of the world. How big are the Badlands? Are we on Earth?
It was great. Cool. We met the other Barons. They once again all had coordinated clothing. Baron Chau has some of the best eyeliner known to man, woman or beast! But then so many die.
And we zoom out again! We see more world. There's more child demons than ever before. By the end, almost everyone is a child demon. WHICH IS COOL! Which is fun! Which is too soon. Especially if they thought they were getting renewed.
Listen, I know it may seem like I'm ragging on the show a bit, but I honestly loved it. And it did more for inclusivity and awesome fight scenes than dozens of others shows have with hundreds more episodes. I just wish they'd let me enjoy the meal they prepared. I wanted more time to chew, but felt like I had to chug everything down so I didn't miss an important backstory moment.
Except this backstory moment. This was bad and it is not this little girl's fault.
Writing, I think, is a lot like mapping out territory. With fiction, you may well be creating the landscape. Non-fic, you're sketching out your past to make it make sense, zoning off areas to make them easier for others to consume. Once it's all said and done, it's up to us (or you, I'm not gonna write your thing for you. Unless...pay me? Let's talk) to decide how quick we run through that map. Sure, there's outside forces. You get a three-book deal and not the seven you wanted. You're only greenlit for 10 more episodes before cancellation. But pushing those off, it's up to you. It's in your control, and what a great power that is.
Almost as powerful as being a black-eyed demon martial artist, if you think about it.
So take your time, make up as much of the world as you possibly can (or as is useful for you telling a good story), but don't forget it's your audiences first time there. They may want to smell the flowers, taste the food. Let them sit in the valleys you've made. Stop and smell the roses...or in this case the opium?
Like so much opium.
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If you liked what you just read, consider following me on twitter and instagram @conorsaidwhat. I post about writing stuff and make stupid jokes there. Hopefully soon I'll be able to tell you some book news! I'm also here on Goodreads. All the photo sources are linked if you click the photos.
Into the Badlands ran on AMC for three seasons and is currently streaming on Netflix. First person who DMs me asking for my password gets it!
Next post is going to be about Kill Creek by Scott Thomas; a gothic haunted house story that has a lot to do with fire!
If you've got any suggestions as to books to read next, I am all ears and would love to hear from you. Reach out on twitter or something and we'll chat. Until then, I leave you with
One Final Dumb Opinion:
The characters’ fighting ability is COMPLETELY subjective to what needs to happen in the plot—and get this—I’m fine with that! I adore some character development and can even get behind surprise showings of hidden talent, but Badlands has said time and time again, “They learned this off-screen.” “Lydia can sword fight now.” “We ran out of budget so this fight is quick.”
It bothers me other times, but here, I found v little fault. Except Lydia v. Cressida. It confused me and I don’t like it. (They both should have lived).
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