Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Twisted Metal’ On Peacock, A Post-Apocalyptic Action-Comedy Based On The Popular PlayStation Game

Video game adaptations into TV series are tough to do, mainly because most video games, even ones with lots of characters, need a lot of plot and character development filled in. A new series, based on a popular PlayStation game series, suffers from this exact problem.

TWISTED METAL: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: Explosions and alarms go off. A devastated cityscape is shown. “Twenty years ago, the world fell to shit. A big old apocalyptic dump,” says a voice.

The Gist: All of the world’s computers went down because of some bug; cities ended up walling themselves off, throwing all of the criminals outside into the chaos, to fight over what was left, “mostly cars and guns,” says the voice.

The voice is John Doe (Anthony Mackie), who is a “milkman”, one of a group of “bad asses, legends, humble motherfuckers like me” who deliver things from one walled-off city to another. Doe, who doesn’t even know what life was like before the apocalypse, has to somehow manage to avoid those criminals, that are constantly after his cargo and bring their weapons-laded vehicles into battle. But his Subaru, which he calls “Evelyn,” is pretty well-armed, too, and Doe is confident in his driving skills. We see that as he barrels through an abandoned mall, being shot at, and listening to Cypress Hill.

At one of his destinations, he’s given a package to take to New San Francisco. When he gets there, he’s invited inside to talk to Raven (Neve Campbell), the city’s COO. She has an offer for Doe, whose reputation precedes him: Retrieve a package from New Chicago and come back within 10 days, and he gets to become a resident of New San Francisco. She even invites Doe to her idyllic apartment and meet whom she claims is her husband and infant son to sell him on the idea.

In the meantime, a brother-sister pair of car thieves are getting chased in Nevada by Agent Stone (Thomas Haden Church) and his crew; he’s the self-appointed law-enforcement savior of the country. He basically tells one of them to kill themselves; the silent sister, Quiet (Stephanie Beatriz), tries to go for the gun Stone gives them, but her brother grabs it first and blows his brains out. She gets branded with a badge to show that she resisted arrest.

Doe takes the risky gig from Raven, and stops at the abandoned diner owned by his old friend Tommy (Lou Beatty Jr.) to get a map (basically a kids’ placemat drawing of the US). Tommy tells him that the 2,000-plus miles from where they are in Southern California to Chicago is full of dangers that Doe hasn’t ever faced on the west coast.

Doe thinks he’s up for the challenge, but when he gets to Nevada, he’s not only sidelined by the grieving Quiet, but they both have to face the guy in charge of Las Vegas: A clown-faced maniac named Sweet Tooth (voice of Will Arnett, body of Joe Seanoa).

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? While the series Twisted Metal is based on a popular PlayStation video game, the series itself plays like a violent, less-funny version of Miracle Workers: End Times.

Our Take: Twisted Metal, adapted for TV by showrunner Michael Jonathan Smith, has plenty of action, plenty of cartoonish violence, and lots of explosions. It also has comedy, at least it’s supposed to have comedy. But most of what’s supposed to be funny about Twisted Metal sounds more forced than funny, and it essentially robs the show of any story momentum as Doe and Quiet make their way to New Chicago and back.

The second episode is a good example of this; as Doe and Quiet are stuck in Vegas at the mercy of Sweet Tooth, who insists on an honest assessment of his one-man show, Stone manages to recruit two new posse members: Stu (Mike Mitchell) and Mike (Tahj Vaughans), one of whom is less than enthused about killing people at Stone’s command. In both stories, we’re sidelined by gags without learning much at all about Quiet, Doe, or Stone. We have no idea what Raven’s ulterior motive is in sending Doe to New Chicago. And we have no idea what Sweet Tooth’s role is going to be going forward.

It just makes for an empty and tiring viewing experience. Between cartoonishly violent action sequences, we have to put up with jokes and asides that fall flat, and nothing that gives us insight into any of the characters. The episodes, most in the 30-35 minute range, don’t even move that quickly. It’s as if Smith and company spent so much time trying to make the show feel like the video games they forgot that there was a need to develop the characters, as well.

Mackie and Beatriz do their best with the material given; Beatriz is especially adept at acting with her face for the time that Quiet is actually, you know, quiet. Campbell is good at displaying phony warmth while being secretly ruthless. But the performances aren’t enough to make up for such shallowly-written characters and situations.

Sex and Skin: Nothing in the first two episodes.

Parting Shot: As Sweet Tooth’s truck barrels towards Doe and Quiet, they stop fighting each other and turn their guns towards the truck.

Sleeper Star: Thomas Haden Church is nearly unrecognizable as Stone, but as soon as his gravelly, folksy voice pipes up, we were happy to hear it.

Most Pilot-y Line: “You’re clearly suicidal, so give me your goddamn belt,” Tommy says to Doe when he hears Doe is driving to New Chicago.

Our Call: SKIP IT. Twisted Metal is noisy and violent, with some decent performances, but that’s about it.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.