For those who don't know, like I didn't years ago, Alex Rider is a series of young adult spy novels akin in tone and style to pre Daniel Craig James Bond films (so evil villains with lair like locations and colourful henchmen and women) following Alex Rider as he ends up sucked into the world of espionage following the death of his uncle who was also, unknown to Alex, a spy.
One of the main problems with the Series is with Stormbreaker having been made into a film previously the producers decided to adapt the second book in the series Point Blanc. The main problem being the series has to try and grapple with putting in the introduction of Alex to the world of espionage at the same time as trying to tell the story from the book. What this unfortunately comes down to is the 8 episode season 1 spending basically the first 2 episode introducing Alex to the world of espionage and only really starting the actual A plot of the series in Episode 3. Alex infact doesn't reach Point Blanc school (the location of his actual mission) until the start of Episode4.
The second main issue with the series is that the producers apparently made the decision that despite Hanna and Jack Ryan both existing as recent fairly gritty spy shows the best thing to do with Alex Rider was to turn out yet another grim gritty spy fiction series best optimised by this picture from IMDB of Alex during a sequence where he's being tortured.
One of the main problems with the Series is with Stormbreaker having been made into a film previously the producers decided to adapt the second book in the series Point Blanc. The main problem being the series has to try and grapple with putting in the introduction of Alex to the world of espionage at the same time as trying to tell the story from the book. What this unfortunately comes down to is the 8 episode season 1 spending basically the first 2 episode introducing Alex to the world of espionage and only really starting the actual A plot of the series in Episode 3. Alex infact doesn't reach Point Blanc school (the location of his actual mission) until the start of Episode4.
The second main issue with the series is that the producers apparently made the decision that despite Hanna and Jack Ryan both existing as recent fairly gritty spy shows the best thing to do with Alex Rider was to turn out yet another grim gritty spy fiction series best optimised by this picture from IMDB of Alex during a sequence where he's being tortured.
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| Image Source = IMDB |
In an age of sombre almost po faced spy series where even the fairly cheesy James Bond has become a grim faced killer it's somewhat disheartening to see The producers not try to go a different direction and offer some more verity to the series. This more serious tone also extends to changes to the gadgets and gear Alex is sent with such that the spy gadgetry ends up just being a disguised communicator in this adaptation.
Before I complain about much else I should probably very briefly outline the plot and be warned I'm just going to spoil stuff so be warned if you open the bit below.
The Plot
I've split the plot into 3 sections because talking about it on one large block as this has multiple different plotlines all of which end up connecting to one another but it's a pain to describe all 3 in one go.
The A plot: Point Blanc
The A plot starts with a couple of prominent businessmen dying under mysterious circumstances and their children inheriting their empires in different fields. The only seeming connection is both children had been sent to a super exclusive boarding school for troubled teenagers and apparently come back as super perfectly behaved teenagers far different to their prior unruly selves. Ian Rider uncovers the link and plans to investigate further but after being called to a meeting with a contact he's assassinated. After Alex discovers the department and agrees to help them they start to look into Point Blanc eventually deciding to send Alex in to investigate. Alex manages to infiltrate the school by posting as Alex Friend son of wealthy businessman David Friend who owes the authorities a few favours for covering up various indiscretions in his business dealings.At the school Alex witnesses two of the students acting strange from the get go and meets some of the other students, who have been at the school various lengths of time. When Laura, one of the more normal students, is sent to the school infirmary having seemingly started to fall ill. During a film showing Sasha, one of the student who has been acting strange, comes over and clumsily attempts to seduce Alex but is rejected by him. The next morning Laura comes back but is now also acting strange and joins the other two abandoning Alex and his group, Alex starts to suspect there is more going on. That night Alex has a strange dream that he's being operated on. Talking to Kyra and James the next day they both reveal they have had the very same dream and decide something more is going on and plan to break into the head of the school Dr Grief's office. Having obtained only 3 of the number to get into his office Alex deduces based on talks Dr Greif has been giving them about controlling humanity and who lives and who dies that the code is 1889 which is the year Hitler was born.
Having added in an extra over-ride code to the door locks Alex, Kyra and James decide it's time for one of them to try and alert the outside world with James being the one who wants to try. Unfortunately James gets cornered by Eva, Dr Greif's assistant, just before he can escape and taken to her room only he never comes back out. Kyra and Alex jam their room locks before lights out and sneak out to investigate finding that Eva's office has a hidden passage leading up to a second floor of the school. There Kyra and Alex find exact copies of their rooms along with screens showing cameras hidden in their own rooms, they also witness Dr Greif kill the schools Doctor after said doctor says he wants more recognition for his work.
The next morning James returns only to sit with Laura and the other students and also start behaving strangely. Kyra knowing she will be next wants to escape but Alex wants to investigate the basement using Kyra's escape as a distraction. There he finds detailed records about Pont Blanc's students including his own along with notes talking about operations that have been performed.
Alex's cover is accidentally blown when a friend back home uploads what he believes to be a silly made up film about Alex being a spy onto youtube not knowing the reality of things. Alex discovers the pupils from Pont Blanc in the basement and they reveal they are the original and it's their clone replacements that are the ones Alex and others saw acting strangely. Dr Greif and his guards capture Alex and decide to try and interrogate him while also revealing the clones are actually his clones modified to look like the students and he plans to take over the world by having them take over key industries. Kyra reveals her escape was partly faked and she actually doubled back over her own footprints to allow her to hide back inside the school and has snuck down to the basement where she frees Alex. Greif still thinking she's escaped orders her parents assassinated to make sure she has no-one to easily go back to or contact. Alex and Kyra manage to fashion a makeshift snowboard with Alex telling Kyra to go and hide and he'll bring help. Alex's escape attempt goes well as he manages to evade or outrun the patrols chasing him only to end up on a road and getting hit by a Truck.
Surviving being hit by a Truck and with The Department aware of his cover being blown they manage to arrive at the hospital as Alex does and set up a fake scenario ready for when people from the school come looking. As Eva goes to see Alex at the hospital she witnesses what she believes to be surgeons who try and fail to save Alex's life and reports back to Greif that Alex is dead. Kyra having stolen one of the radios also overhears the news Alex is dead and begins to lose hope.
Mrs Jones (Alex's handler) and a special forces team talk with Alex and plan an attack with Alex saying to put out a repeating message on the channel he and Kyra had agreed to tune to on the radios saying that he's alive and help is coming. Despite Mrs Jones's objections Alex insists on coming with the special forces team to help with the rescue.
During the siege on the school Kyra appears and tells Alex to follower her, he does only for it to be revealed to be the fake clone Kyra who has lead Alex into a trap where he's attacked by Eva. Proving she's more than a match for him Alex manages to defeat her by causing some gas bottles to explode, surviving himself by hiding in a recess in the room away from the blast. Dr Greif is taken into custody along with the clones but he refuses to co-operate. At Point Blanc it's revealed they missed one clone, Alex's.
The final Episode of the series sees the clone of Alex getting to the UK and trying to ruin the real Alex's life both with his friend and his crush culminating in a confrontation at his school prom and The Department showing up to deal with the clone whom Alex's friend Tom helps identify but is ultimately killed by an unknown (To the Department) sniper on the school roof.
The scarred man tells Wilby that The Department suspect him and shows him the surveillance footage of The Department installing their own surveillance kit in his apartment. This spurs Wilby to visit Alex's home and meet Jack (Alex's Guardian / Housekeeper / Nanny) and acquires a picture of Alex with his best friend Tom believing The Department may be using Alex and his information will allow him to join the scarred man and his associates. As Wilby collects a hidden money stash and phone he tried to contact an unknown person to warn them of the potential breach only to be killed by The Scarred man who picks up the picture of Alex and Tom.
The Department who were also tracking Wilby turn up only to find his body and his mobile phone, which they attempt to call the single number on there only for the line to go dead and the number to be deactivated when they try a second time.
The Scarred man is informed that there has been a breach and new security details are to be given out. While at Point Blanc to give Dr Greif his new security I.D. he passes on the photograph of Alex and Tom to Greif to look into. Looking into the picture Greif finds The Department's fake social media and background info on Alex but no information on Tom. Eventually with the help of The Scarred Man and his associate they find Tom on CCTV having visited Alex while at the Friend family's country estate and manage to trace him back to the school. Offering him a chance to showcase his film making work for a media executive who is in reality one of Greif's clone acting as an imposter. Greif's clone capture and interrogates Tom eventually unlocking his phone and seeing a fake Alex Rider super Spy short video Tom had created and sending it over to Greif before preparing to Kill Tom, only to be stopped by The Department just in time.
Alex's investigations reveal no link to Ian's murder at Point Blanc. However the department have more luck with the Captured Greif clone along with him phone and a voice synthesising system.
After his capture Dr Greif is assassinated by The Scarred Man to hide the organisation acting to aid Greif. During a De-brief Alex mentions having seen The Scarred Man at Pont Blanc at one point after Alex has left she passes this information onto director Blunt the head of The Department and they realise an organisation called Scorpia is back and operating again after previously thought to have been defeated. The Scarred man is revealed to be called Yassen Gregorovitch who was the mystery Sniper on the school roof who killed Alex's clone in the finale of the show.
The next day at School Tom gets asked to prom by a girl and suggests Alex should ask the girl he has a crush on to come with him to the prom too. They arrange to meet later to watch old Samuri films. On the way home Alex is hit by a truck and then kidnapped. Alex not having returned home Jack phones Tom sure he will know where Alex is only for Tom to reveal Alex left to go home and never showed up to watch Samurai films. Worried Jack convinces Tom to give her the password to Alex's computer and discovers the cover up. Jack phones the "bank number" which is actually The department to reveal she knows, Mrs Jones (Alex's handler) goes to meet Jack and after finding Alex isn't home determines The Department is testing him without telling her. After Alex passes the test The Department were conducting by testing his resistance to torture he's returned home.
The next day at school Alex tells Tom his was attacked by some people in the park. A day later Alex and Tom get invited to come see a film by some of the girls at the school. Unfortunately Alex has to ditch the plans to go see a film to start his infiltration of Point Blanc by going to the Friend residence. Tom goes to Alex's house where Alex claims to be sick and call Jack out when she tries to lie that Alex is off staying at other friends houses. Tom finds where Alex is from Jack and poses as a Pizza deliveryman to talk to him and finds out from Alex that Alex's uncle was a spy.
A silly youtube video of Tom's attracts the attention of Dr Greif and the other villains due to it featuring Alex and Tom is lured into a trap to try and get more information. He doesn't spill much even with being threatened with being killed but his unlocked phone gives the access to his files including the video and Alex Rider as a spy. The school phones Jack to check if Tom has skipped school to see Alex (who's cover story at school is he's ill). Jack phones Tom's phone to try and find him but when he fails to answer she contacts The Department to alert them to a potential problem. It's The Department who manage to rescue Tom and check the potential his video has to be a liability deciding it's really not one.
After Alex gets back from his mission there's some tension between Tom and Alex thanks to Alex's clone trying to interfere eventually luring Tom away from the prom to act as bait to bring Alex to him. It's in the end Tom who helps identify which is the real Alex and which is his clone at the school.
There are a number of fairly major changes between the book and the series which I'm going to have to discuss in part in the next sections so those will also be under spoiler warnings.
Suffice to say fans of the books will find this adaptation quite lacking but the show also isn't really aiming for the normal audience of the more grim spy fiction but trying to make a version of it for teens which shaves a lot of the potential dark edge off the show too.
So here's some of the changes from the book where the series tries to be woke and ends up becoming actually problematic. Oh and this is just from reading the wikipedia article and a few bits of the Alex Rider Wiki not being a super deep fan of the series.
In the book Point Blanc is an all boys school, in the series it's mixed and that means they have to explain how Dr Greif has female clones not just male ones which they brush off by claiming it would be a simple edit to the chromosomes during Mitosis. No. X and Y chromosomes are very different and as such it wouldn't just be a simple edit worse still if they wanted to argue Dr Greif used his own X chromosome to make a XX female pairing it would mean she would be subject to a number of potential recessive conditions.
Adding in female characters at Point Blanc doesn't do much and might actually be more problematic as while Kyra frees Alex once she could be described as a helpful damsel trope character turning out to be helpful at times for her computer hacking skills. She spends most of one of the episodes basically cowering in a basement waiting for Alex to come back and save her and the others. Oh and her other role is to be a sort of implicit love interest of sorts for Alex whom if this adaptation of Alex Rider manages to even get another series I'm sure she'll be entirely forgotten.
Dr Greif in the original book was actually a Pro-Apartheid South African mad scientist who is described as a very clear white supremacist. In the show they tone down his racist rhetoric quite a bit and remove the whole thing about him being Pro-Apartheid or from South Africa instead implying he's just a mad Scientist who admires Hitler and wishes to enact some of Hitler's ideas about world domination and how the world should be. The change seems to be the series choosing to go with a more obvious recognisable villain rather than the lesser used lesser known Pro-Apartheid believers which just feels cheap and like it's covering up a fairly little discussed subject in favour of connecting Greif to a more widely acknowledged evil group.
Part of the removal of the more overt White Supremacist elements to Dr Greif's character in the series and the diversification of the students at the school it means one of his clones is modified to be a black girl. Which means this might be one of the first shows that's given the world a black woman Neo-Nazi....... they really didn't think that one through. Also in context one of the clones lines ends up being hilariously awful as she says "I think I'm pretty, I think I'm prettier than most other girls."
The book really doesn't have much romance implied or otherwise for Alex while the show sees Alex
somewhat hilariously become a woman magnet to an extent with two different girls showing some level of interest in him and one even attempting to kiss him. Also he has Fiona Friend another side character initially try to tease him somewhat after she comes out of a hot tub in her bikini. The female characters in Alex Rider (that have enough screen time to get a character beyond just a name) can basically be classified into 'Some-ones girlfriend / love interest" or a "mother figure for Alex" with the exception being Eagle who I'll tackle next.
Eagle in the books isn't really mentioned much but the film Stormbreaker chose to characterise him and a young black special forces operative. In the series Eagle is a white woman Sniper, because apparently Hideo Kojima hasn't run having the woman be the sniper trope into the ground yet. Well done series you managed to replace a potential black male character role with a white woman.
In the books Jack is a red haired American woman, in the series she is a black woman which yeh did no-one think maybe it's not a good idea to have the black woman be a housekeeper / nanny? I mean the novels have Mrs Jones as black and for some reason the series chose to make her white. So did anyone think this through? Capable government operative looking out for Alex and meant to have quite a bit of authority vs nanny / housekeeper........ yeh.......didn't think that one through either and I can only guess they wanted to have oblivious critics call it stunning and brave because of being able to read a fairly hollow commentary into the sequence with Jack being threatened with deportation .
Eva in the Point Blanc book is mentioned as being a "Miss South Africa Weightlifting champion 5 years in a row" and also "described as having huge muscles and a facial structure that 'wasn't quite human" according to the Alex Rider Fandom wiki. In the show she's not a hulking muscle woman but seems more like a generic evil female secretary in her look. So much for the potential female body diversity points even if she was a villain.
Also speaking of Eva in the book she is killed by the black lead of the special forces unit called Wolf in what could be seen as a pretty symbolic moment as he saves Alex from her. In the series Alex kills her in an explosion. So much for the symbolism element there.
Having added in an extra over-ride code to the door locks Alex, Kyra and James decide it's time for one of them to try and alert the outside world with James being the one who wants to try. Unfortunately James gets cornered by Eva, Dr Greif's assistant, just before he can escape and taken to her room only he never comes back out. Kyra and Alex jam their room locks before lights out and sneak out to investigate finding that Eva's office has a hidden passage leading up to a second floor of the school. There Kyra and Alex find exact copies of their rooms along with screens showing cameras hidden in their own rooms, they also witness Dr Greif kill the schools Doctor after said doctor says he wants more recognition for his work.
The next morning James returns only to sit with Laura and the other students and also start behaving strangely. Kyra knowing she will be next wants to escape but Alex wants to investigate the basement using Kyra's escape as a distraction. There he finds detailed records about Pont Blanc's students including his own along with notes talking about operations that have been performed.
Alex's cover is accidentally blown when a friend back home uploads what he believes to be a silly made up film about Alex being a spy onto youtube not knowing the reality of things. Alex discovers the pupils from Pont Blanc in the basement and they reveal they are the original and it's their clone replacements that are the ones Alex and others saw acting strangely. Dr Greif and his guards capture Alex and decide to try and interrogate him while also revealing the clones are actually his clones modified to look like the students and he plans to take over the world by having them take over key industries. Kyra reveals her escape was partly faked and she actually doubled back over her own footprints to allow her to hide back inside the school and has snuck down to the basement where she frees Alex. Greif still thinking she's escaped orders her parents assassinated to make sure she has no-one to easily go back to or contact. Alex and Kyra manage to fashion a makeshift snowboard with Alex telling Kyra to go and hide and he'll bring help. Alex's escape attempt goes well as he manages to evade or outrun the patrols chasing him only to end up on a road and getting hit by a Truck.
Surviving being hit by a Truck and with The Department aware of his cover being blown they manage to arrive at the hospital as Alex does and set up a fake scenario ready for when people from the school come looking. As Eva goes to see Alex at the hospital she witnesses what she believes to be surgeons who try and fail to save Alex's life and reports back to Greif that Alex is dead. Kyra having stolen one of the radios also overhears the news Alex is dead and begins to lose hope.
Mrs Jones (Alex's handler) and a special forces team talk with Alex and plan an attack with Alex saying to put out a repeating message on the channel he and Kyra had agreed to tune to on the radios saying that he's alive and help is coming. Despite Mrs Jones's objections Alex insists on coming with the special forces team to help with the rescue.
During the siege on the school Kyra appears and tells Alex to follower her, he does only for it to be revealed to be the fake clone Kyra who has lead Alex into a trap where he's attacked by Eva. Proving she's more than a match for him Alex manages to defeat her by causing some gas bottles to explode, surviving himself by hiding in a recess in the room away from the blast. Dr Greif is taken into custody along with the clones but he refuses to co-operate. At Point Blanc it's revealed they missed one clone, Alex's.
The final Episode of the series sees the clone of Alex getting to the UK and trying to ruin the real Alex's life both with his friend and his crush culminating in a confrontation at his school prom and The Department showing up to deal with the clone whom Alex's friend Tom helps identify but is ultimately killed by an unknown (To the Department) sniper on the school roof.
Plot B: Ian rider's death
Before he can investigate Ian Rider is killed off by his own partner Wilby with the help of a third man with scars down his face (whom I shall refer to as the scarred man). The pair having set it up to look like a North Korean hit with Wilby also being non fatally shot. The scarred man asks for Wilby to make sure The Department is accepting the fake story. Unknown to Wilby the scarred man has set up surveillance on his flat to make sure nothing goes wrong. The Department however suspect there is more going on to Ian's death and the North Korean hit story is too convenient so decide to investigate further locking Ian's file behind high level clearance to protect Alex's identity and placing their own surveillance in Wilby's flat.The scarred man tells Wilby that The Department suspect him and shows him the surveillance footage of The Department installing their own surveillance kit in his apartment. This spurs Wilby to visit Alex's home and meet Jack (Alex's Guardian / Housekeeper / Nanny) and acquires a picture of Alex with his best friend Tom believing The Department may be using Alex and his information will allow him to join the scarred man and his associates. As Wilby collects a hidden money stash and phone he tried to contact an unknown person to warn them of the potential breach only to be killed by The Scarred man who picks up the picture of Alex and Tom.
The Department who were also tracking Wilby turn up only to find his body and his mobile phone, which they attempt to call the single number on there only for the line to go dead and the number to be deactivated when they try a second time.
The Scarred man is informed that there has been a breach and new security details are to be given out. While at Point Blanc to give Dr Greif his new security I.D. he passes on the photograph of Alex and Tom to Greif to look into. Looking into the picture Greif finds The Department's fake social media and background info on Alex but no information on Tom. Eventually with the help of The Scarred Man and his associate they find Tom on CCTV having visited Alex while at the Friend family's country estate and manage to trace him back to the school. Offering him a chance to showcase his film making work for a media executive who is in reality one of Greif's clone acting as an imposter. Greif's clone capture and interrogates Tom eventually unlocking his phone and seeing a fake Alex Rider super Spy short video Tom had created and sending it over to Greif before preparing to Kill Tom, only to be stopped by The Department just in time.
Alex's investigations reveal no link to Ian's murder at Point Blanc. However the department have more luck with the Captured Greif clone along with him phone and a voice synthesising system.
After his capture Dr Greif is assassinated by The Scarred Man to hide the organisation acting to aid Greif. During a De-brief Alex mentions having seen The Scarred Man at Pont Blanc at one point after Alex has left she passes this information onto director Blunt the head of The Department and they realise an organisation called Scorpia is back and operating again after previously thought to have been defeated. The Scarred man is revealed to be called Yassen Gregorovitch who was the mystery Sniper on the school roof who killed Alex's clone in the finale of the show.
Plot C Alex's friends and family.
While trying to recover his best friend Tom's phone Alex gets caught and the phone put into the glove compartment of his uncle's car. After his uncle is killed Alex manages to use the dead phone to track the cars location and discovers The Department also recovering Tom's phone in the process. Jack, Alex's Nanny / House Keeper ends up as his legal guardian but is her Visa status is used as leverage to convince Alex to work for The Department.The next day at School Tom gets asked to prom by a girl and suggests Alex should ask the girl he has a crush on to come with him to the prom too. They arrange to meet later to watch old Samuri films. On the way home Alex is hit by a truck and then kidnapped. Alex not having returned home Jack phones Tom sure he will know where Alex is only for Tom to reveal Alex left to go home and never showed up to watch Samurai films. Worried Jack convinces Tom to give her the password to Alex's computer and discovers the cover up. Jack phones the "bank number" which is actually The department to reveal she knows, Mrs Jones (Alex's handler) goes to meet Jack and after finding Alex isn't home determines The Department is testing him without telling her. After Alex passes the test The Department were conducting by testing his resistance to torture he's returned home.
The next day at school Alex tells Tom his was attacked by some people in the park. A day later Alex and Tom get invited to come see a film by some of the girls at the school. Unfortunately Alex has to ditch the plans to go see a film to start his infiltration of Point Blanc by going to the Friend residence. Tom goes to Alex's house where Alex claims to be sick and call Jack out when she tries to lie that Alex is off staying at other friends houses. Tom finds where Alex is from Jack and poses as a Pizza deliveryman to talk to him and finds out from Alex that Alex's uncle was a spy.
A silly youtube video of Tom's attracts the attention of Dr Greif and the other villains due to it featuring Alex and Tom is lured into a trap to try and get more information. He doesn't spill much even with being threatened with being killed but his unlocked phone gives the access to his files including the video and Alex Rider as a spy. The school phones Jack to check if Tom has skipped school to see Alex (who's cover story at school is he's ill). Jack phones Tom's phone to try and find him but when he fails to answer she contacts The Department to alert them to a potential problem. It's The Department who manage to rescue Tom and check the potential his video has to be a liability deciding it's really not one.
After Alex gets back from his mission there's some tension between Tom and Alex thanks to Alex's clone trying to interfere eventually luring Tom away from the prom to act as bait to bring Alex to him. It's in the end Tom who helps identify which is the real Alex and which is his clone at the school.
There are a number of fairly major changes between the book and the series which I'm going to have to discuss in part in the next sections so those will also be under spoiler warnings.
Suffice to say fans of the books will find this adaptation quite lacking but the show also isn't really aiming for the normal audience of the more grim spy fiction but trying to make a version of it for teens which shaves a lot of the potential dark edge off the show too.
Wokeness
Look merely calling a section this will likely rile some people up but it's my position there's a difference between what I'd call organic diversity or changes that make sense and changes that feel like they were done purely to fill a check box or to push a message and not fully thought through. Wokeness is surface level and can often end up more problematic in the end.So here's some of the changes from the book where the series tries to be woke and ends up becoming actually problematic. Oh and this is just from reading the wikipedia article and a few bits of the Alex Rider Wiki not being a super deep fan of the series.
In the book Point Blanc is an all boys school, in the series it's mixed and that means they have to explain how Dr Greif has female clones not just male ones which they brush off by claiming it would be a simple edit to the chromosomes during Mitosis. No. X and Y chromosomes are very different and as such it wouldn't just be a simple edit worse still if they wanted to argue Dr Greif used his own X chromosome to make a XX female pairing it would mean she would be subject to a number of potential recessive conditions.
Adding in female characters at Point Blanc doesn't do much and might actually be more problematic as while Kyra frees Alex once she could be described as a helpful damsel trope character turning out to be helpful at times for her computer hacking skills. She spends most of one of the episodes basically cowering in a basement waiting for Alex to come back and save her and the others. Oh and her other role is to be a sort of implicit love interest of sorts for Alex whom if this adaptation of Alex Rider manages to even get another series I'm sure she'll be entirely forgotten.
Dr Greif in the original book was actually a Pro-Apartheid South African mad scientist who is described as a very clear white supremacist. In the show they tone down his racist rhetoric quite a bit and remove the whole thing about him being Pro-Apartheid or from South Africa instead implying he's just a mad Scientist who admires Hitler and wishes to enact some of Hitler's ideas about world domination and how the world should be. The change seems to be the series choosing to go with a more obvious recognisable villain rather than the lesser used lesser known Pro-Apartheid believers which just feels cheap and like it's covering up a fairly little discussed subject in favour of connecting Greif to a more widely acknowledged evil group.
Part of the removal of the more overt White Supremacist elements to Dr Greif's character in the series and the diversification of the students at the school it means one of his clones is modified to be a black girl. Which means this might be one of the first shows that's given the world a black woman Neo-Nazi....... they really didn't think that one through. Also in context one of the clones lines ends up being hilariously awful as she says "I think I'm pretty, I think I'm prettier than most other girls."
The book really doesn't have much romance implied or otherwise for Alex while the show sees Alex
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| Fiona Friend, Image Source = IMDB |
Eagle in the books isn't really mentioned much but the film Stormbreaker chose to characterise him and a young black special forces operative. In the series Eagle is a white woman Sniper, because apparently Hideo Kojima hasn't run having the woman be the sniper trope into the ground yet. Well done series you managed to replace a potential black male character role with a white woman.
In the books Jack is a red haired American woman, in the series she is a black woman which yeh did no-one think maybe it's not a good idea to have the black woman be a housekeeper / nanny? I mean the novels have Mrs Jones as black and for some reason the series chose to make her white. So did anyone think this through? Capable government operative looking out for Alex and meant to have quite a bit of authority vs nanny / housekeeper........ yeh.......didn't think that one through either and I can only guess they wanted to have oblivious critics call it stunning and brave because of being able to read a fairly hollow commentary into the sequence with Jack being threatened with deportation .
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| Eva in Alex Rider tv series |
Also speaking of Eva in the book she is killed by the black lead of the special forces unit called Wolf in what could be seen as a pretty symbolic moment as he saves Alex from her. In the series Alex kills her in an explosion. So much for the symbolism element there.
Acting / Casting:
Unlike the Stormbreaker film there's no real weak performances here. Otto Farrant feels well cast as Alex Rider not like the pretty boy whose father was financing the movie Stormbreaker that had Alex look like he fell out of a boy band line up. Also Otto Farrant's acting is far better than Alex Pettyfer's was in the role when he played Alex Rider. Also worthy of note is Marli Siu who plays Kyra who pulls off a stellar performance with what she's given seemingly really putting her heart into the role. While not having the most lines Howard Charles does an great job playing the role of Wolf the head of the special forces unit with him being an imposing, intimidating presence in most scenes he's in.
Effects & action scenes.
The action scenes are fine however they feel unevenly used with the first few episodes having chase sequences and a sort of free running sequence (not in the books to the best of my research) and an explosive finale to the Point Blanc section. The problem comes with the actual finale of the series not giving people the exciting rooftop chase and explosion of the books but instead a fairly basic fight in the middle of a school disco. The ending very much feels like a low point and them trying to piece something together that would be far cheaper to shoot, ultimately making the actual shows ending feel like a tacked on after thought of an episode.Conclusion.
Alex Rider the show prominently bears the scars of the alleged production problems the show has allegedly suffered with in development with it struggling to really forge its own identity as a series. The show comes off as though when an executive was asked what they wanted they pointed to the Stormbreaker film and said "Not that." The problem being it doesn't forge its own identity really just trying to ape the style of its contemporary gritty spy show fellows but not being a property that can really go to the places said other shows can go. Not being able to go to said places leaves the show feeling like Jason Bourne for teenagers. None of this is helped by an extremely slow start up yet somehow managing to then feel like it rushes through the actual Point Blanc story too fast and then has to drag its feet to get enough material for a final episode. The show is at its best when characters are slightly over the top or coming out with a quick witty response e.g. Alex: I know Krav Maga
Department Agent: I know how to shoot people in the head, why don't we calm down have a cup of tea and a chat?
The changes made from the books likely will upset fans including cutting out some sequences from the books. The seeming lack of its own style will put off others and the hilariously poorly thought out attempts to appear woke will likely annoy anyone with half a working brain.
Who can I recommend this too? Well people who want just about passable entertainment to fill in some time with little else on a backlog to watch. It's not a show that can say you should rush to see because it's so good, it's also not a terrible show worth watching just to laugh and see how bad it is either which puts it firmly in the disposable and fairly forgettable middle ground.
If I were to speculate on some of the ideas going on with the show I'd have to suggest the show runners or studio behind it were hoping this would end up big with the shipping community due to the various relationships that develop or are implied to be possible in the show. If the show can figure out what it wants to be then despite the issues the cast are strong enough to make the show into something good but it needs to transition to embracing it's more over the top old school James Bond elements and not try to be a gritty spy thriller series because it's really not.
Department Agent: I know how to shoot people in the head, why don't we calm down have a cup of tea and a chat?
The changes made from the books likely will upset fans including cutting out some sequences from the books. The seeming lack of its own style will put off others and the hilariously poorly thought out attempts to appear woke will likely annoy anyone with half a working brain.
Who can I recommend this too? Well people who want just about passable entertainment to fill in some time with little else on a backlog to watch. It's not a show that can say you should rush to see because it's so good, it's also not a terrible show worth watching just to laugh and see how bad it is either which puts it firmly in the disposable and fairly forgettable middle ground.
If I were to speculate on some of the ideas going on with the show I'd have to suggest the show runners or studio behind it were hoping this would end up big with the shipping community due to the various relationships that develop or are implied to be possible in the show. If the show can figure out what it wants to be then despite the issues the cast are strong enough to make the show into something good but it needs to transition to embracing it's more over the top old school James Bond elements and not try to be a gritty spy thriller series because it's really not.
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