Metal Hurlant Chronicles

This French series (shot in English) adapts stories from the "Metal Hurlant" magazine, which eventually became "Heavy Metal" in the U.S. Director Guillaume Lubrano helms six 25-minute episodes with the common thread being a metal/rock meteor (the Metal Hurlant) screaming past each of these alien worlds before each story.

"King's Crown" has peasants on a floating rock of a planet engaging in a combat tournament to determine the new king. Two of the better combatants are Michael Jai White and Scott Adkins. "Shelter Me" has a girl (Michelle Ryan) waking up in a bomb shelter and being told by a man (James Marsters) that he saved her before a nuclear war. Soon she starts doubting his story. "Three on a Match" has three men (Craig Fairbrass, Dominique Pinon, and Eriq Ebouaney) battling for space on an escape pod. "Red Light / Cold Hard Facts" is an episode split in two and was apparently the pilot that Lubrano shot to get the series greenlit. "Red Light" focuses on a prisoner (David Belle of the BANLIEUE 13 series) fighting a guard (French MMA fighter Cyril Diabate) while trying to escape a high-tech prison; "Cold Hard Facts" has folks in the 24th century discovering a 20th century cryogenic patient that they resurrect. "Pledge of Anya" has a young warrior sent by his master (Rutger Hauer) to the planet Earth to destroy a "dragon." Finally, "Master of Destiny" focuses on a intergalactic hunter named Hondo (Joe Flanigan) who sets out on a quest to find a planet where the alien race can tell you when you are going to die. This one might gain the most interest from fans as it adapts a story co-written by Alejandro Jodorowsky back in the day.

Being not all that familiar with the source material, I still found this to be a fun series and got through the two and a half hours quickly. Lubrano has definitely chosen some good stories to adapt. Sure, you'll see some twists coming a mile away, but others not so much. He also has a pretty great visual style and some of the space shots are great, esp. for a low budget series. Another thing I liked was his casting as he got some good familiar faces in there (although I doubt Hauer was ever on set with anything but a green screen) and I'll never complain about seeing White and Adkins face off. A second season has been greenlit so look for that.

This TV show is a kind of punk version of the 50s classic "Twilight Zone". The stories told are out of short stories found into "Métal Hurlant", a very important comics and science fiction magazine published between 1975 and 1987 (and also in the US under the name of "Heavy Metal"), where it was possible to read people like Druillet, Moebius, Wrightson or Corben. Two animated movies have been done : Heavy Metal and Heavy Metal 2000. The "Metal Hurlant Chronicles" is made of short episodes : stories and actors are never the same ones. The cast is quite surprising, with American and french actors. There are only six episodes (making seven stories, as one episode is sliced in two different stories) and the result is quite fair, even if the special effects can seem a little cheesy, but it might be on purpose, as it is naive and funny science-fiction.

My wife and I tore through these episodes pretty quickly. They were quite enjoyable and we made a game of trying to guess the "twist" endings. Most of the time, the twists had twists! In one episode, the twist was there wasn't a twist! Being a half-hour show also also eliminated the padding that you would have gotten with hour-long episodes. I also thought the series had pretty good special effects for a low budget effort. It succeeded in capturing the flavor of Heavy Metal magazine and it looked quite different than anything else on TV. I hope SyFi or some other network picks it up. It's great news that the producers are making a second season.

Back in the 80s this would have been heralded as something quite special, and possibly even, cutting edge. Unfortunately, although still entertaining, this is poorly executed and a real missed opportunity.

I've been a fan of the Heavy Metal magazine ever since the early 80s, and although it could be regarded as sexist, misogynistic, puerile and overly graphic, especially today, it still has been the spawning ground for some pretty state-of-the-art stories and artists. The late great Jean (Moebius) Giraud being one of many that were ported over from Metal Hurlant to Heavy Metal.

This is why I find it sad that the Metal Hurlant Chronicles is so bad. The stories are hit and miss, some a lot better than others, the acting verges on laughable and the special effect.... well, some of those are not too bad to be fair.

To be totally honest, the first season was not too bad, and did have some pretty good stories. But the second season.... what the hell happened...!?!?!?!?!? The stories and acting took a nosedive. At the end of most the episodes I sit there thinking "Is that it????!!!!???" No clever twist or sting in the tail. Just a dull end to a dull story. I watched the episode "The Second Son" last night. Truly awful.

So my advice would be: > Switch your mind back to 80s thinking. > Maybe have a beer or 2. > And only watch the first season.

For the sake of nostalgia and that the first season is passable, I'll give it 4 stars.

i have a pretty high tolerance for science fiction, even goofy campy science fiction, heck i liked lexx, but this the some serious dreck. a few of the episodes rise up towards mediocrity... sort of like a bad episode of the 80s show "tales from the dark side", with obviously telegraphed twist ends and sub par acting but at least a decent narrative structure and look. the others look like they are plays written and produced as class assignments for a middle school creative writing class and acted by people banded from normal TV for gross incompetence. i'll admit some of the problems may be from the source material, i remember the magazine when i read it in the 80s had a tendency toward ham handed plots and obvious twist endings, but you would think the producers would have at least cherry picked their story lines from the publications long run of issues.