Return to the darkness
THE eagerly awaited Netflix fantasy series, The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, is a powerful testament to the truth of two basic, yet frequently overlooked aspects of modern television and film-making.
Firstly, story is everything. Without a solid one, you have nothing. Secondly, you really just can’t beat practical effects and performances.
This 10-episode series — which is a prequel to the 1982 movie The Dark Crystal — not only has a sweeping and wellcrafted story at its core, it also sticks to the same remarkable puppetry used to bring the original to life, with minimal digital interference.
So when I say that a whole new generation of kids — and possibly quite a few adults — are about to experience a fresh wave of nightmares inspired by the horrifying Skeksis and the weirdly creepy Gelfling, I say it with a lot of love and excitement.
The original film took us to the planet Thra, where the Crystal of Truth had been corrupted by a race of evil creatures, the Skeksis, and it was up to a pair of young Gelfling to heal the crystal with a missing shard and restore balance to Thra.
Age of Resistance takes us back to a time before those events, before Thra had turned dark and menacing, when there was still life and hope.
We learn there are seven clans of the elflike Gelfling scattered across Thra, including the Vapra, a ruling class living high in the mountains, the warriors of Stonewood in the forest, and the underground-dwelling Grottan clan.
The Skeksis have already established themselves as Keepers of the Crystal, having built a palace around the Crystal of Truth and demanding tithes from all the other inhabitants of Thra, while they use the crystal to give themselves eternal life.
To most of the other creatures of Thra, the Skeksis are seen as little more than a group of benevolent, mystical rulers who exist to keep order and protect the world.
But three Gelfling will discover the awful truth and must find a way to convince the rest of Thra of what they have learned and stop the corruption that is spreading from the crystal into all life in Thra.
The first episode takes a while to really get rolling, mostly because it has a lot of background story to establish.
So it makes use of some dense narration by Sigourney Weaver at the beginning, and a few awkward clumps of expository dialogue early on, but once it gets the heavy lifting out of the way, it moves along pretty smoothly. And there is some truly fantastic world-building going on here, which is one of the great luxuries of being able to tell a story across 10 hours of television, rather than a single two-hour film.
This series, directed by Louis Leterrier, does an excellent job of balancing the need for moving the story forward with just enough evocation and bits of fan service to keep it grounded within the established universe.
There is undeniably huge nostalgic value in the first appearances of creatures like landstriders and fizgigs on screen, but these are downplayed nicely, so as not to be obnoxious. And seeing the slightly younger versions of the Skeksis is quite fascinating as well — as thoroughly hideous as they are.
Learning a little more about Aughra’s origins puts the original story in a whole new light as well.
The voice talent is simply outstanding. Taron Egerton voices the Gelfling soldier Rian, joined by Helena Bonham Carter as the Gelfling queen All-Maudra.
Benedict Wong voices the sinister Skeksis General, while the Skeksis Scientist has the unmistakeable voice of Mark Hamill, and the whining Skeksis Chamberlain is voiced by Simon Pegg — who, I’m sure, was fanboying harder than anyone about working with Luke Skywalker.
The rest of the voice cast is rounded out by the likes of Mark Strong, Awkwafina, Lena Headey, Eddie Izzard, Alicia Vikander, and Natalie Dormer but, as great as these voices are, the puppetry is the truly remarkable part of the performance.
Even 37 years after the original movie’s 1982 release, the creature-design and performances underpinning this Jim Henson movie are still as eerily lifelike and compelling as ever.
I doubt many CGI-and motion-capture-loaded flicks of the past few years will look as good in 40 years’ time.
And the same care and imagination have gone into recreating that magical world for a new audience, all through the use of physical puppets and performances.
The only time any CGI has been used is to digitally erase puppeteers from some shots and to create a handful of trickier action shots and effects.
Just like the 1982 film — which was without doubt Henson’s most nightmarish creation — The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance does a masterful job of creating a richly detailed world and drawing you deep into its realism.
Yeah, it’s all as creepy as ever, but that’s part of the experience.
And the nostalgia mostly exists to hook you in the beginning, while there is plenty of excellent storytelling to keep you watching.