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The New Legends of Monkey

ABC's new kids' series aims to be so broad & heavy with its accents that it loses a lot of zing.

In the mythical, part-CGI setting of The New Legends of Monkey, time and place are a bit of a moving feast.

It may look like TV China, or at least TV China made in New Zealand, but the central character orphan Tripitaka (Luciane Buchanan) sports an American accent. She is surrounded, initially, by other American accents emanating from wise Chinese monks, until New Zealand and even cockney British characters are added to the soundscape.

For the juvenile audience to which this new series is directed, it’s hard to escape the notion that everything is not what it seems.

To be fair The New Legends of Monkey is not looking to reboot the cult Japanese series Monkey. This ABC / Netflix production is based on the 16th Century Chinese fable Journey to the West (as was Monkey itself). There have been some concessions for a modern audience, notably Tripitaka becoming a teenage girl instead of a young monk and local god Sha Wujing aka Sandy, also changing gender to female.

Tripitaka, in her quest to thwart demons and find her parents, befriends sidekicks Wizard of Oz-like. One is the Monkey king himself (Chai Hansen), a muscly pop-star like expert in martial arts and comedy, the roguish Pigsy (Josh Thomson) who carries a mean pitchfork, and water god Sandy (Emilie Cocquerel) who would probably be right at home as one of Lady Gaga’s little monsters.

Across the opening 3 episodes (strung together as a “telemovie”), the four will battle a platinum-haired demon who is a cross between David Bowie in Labyrinth and Orlando Bloom in Lord of the Rings. Various martial arts quests will cross with jeopardy and comedy as Tripitaka clings fast to the ancient proverb that “Hope Must Never Die.”

Yet there is little tension underneath the theatrics and obvious work that has gone into the production (the lighting is particularly good), and the opening chapter stretches the friendship somewhat. Whilst Buchanan and Hansen shoot for sincerity in their performances, they are inadequately matched by some rather wet villains and distracting supporting cast. The cacophony of accents does little to help and a synth music soundtrack is another vanilla touch.

The whole production reeks of trying to go broad, and presumably for an American audience, at the expense of the source material. Questions should be asked about whether ABC and Screen Australia are putting Australian voices and Australian stories on the screen for child audiences (the latter has been particularly strident about maintaining Aussie accents). At least Dance Academy and Nowhere Boys are true blue in their DNA.

I guess this might trigger some martial arts interest amongst the audience, but The New Legends of Monkey does little for Chinese culture. In its shorter form it will presumably offer a more snackable treat, but so far it just made me long for the kooky comedy of the ’70s Japanese version on a fraction of the budget.

The New Legends of Monkey begins 6pm Sunday January 28 on ABC ME.

 

 

7 Responses

  1. I used to watch the old Monkey back in the day. I’ve now watched Season 1 of this new Legends of Monkey on ABC iview. I think it shows potential. The main characters are strong enough and I think portraying Tripi and Sandy as females is a good idea. What I miss is the Buddhist philosophy that the narrator used to impart in the old series and the slapstick comedy and dubbing. Sooo funny. But seriously, give this lot a fair go. Lets see what happens. Btw…..Sandy is my favourite…..tee hee hee.

  2. I missed this last night and ABC doesn’t look like its doing an encore for a month, plus iView doesn’t work very good here. Was a huge fan of the original when I was a kid, hope they haven’t stuffed it up!

  3. Considering that the gimmick for a lot of folks is the connection to the older series, I don’t see much of the intended audience actually caring.
    If shows like Tomorrow When the War Began which attempt to be of decent quality couldn’t get a grip, then I cannot see how this will.

    I really cannot see tweens or older kids caring at all about this plot or the terrible CGI, not when the vastly superior Legend of Korra is already airing on the network.

  4. Your review says the show was made for a juvenile audience,well juveniles of both sexes do like some quirky stuff, mostly weird misshapen cartoon characters and stories that are sometimes gross, tasteless and absurd, 6 to 8 year old kids in particular love it, so it will be interesting to see which part of the world will get the highest rating numbers if the New Legends of Monkey is also being shown on Netflix overseas.

  5. One of the things that babyboomers who grew up on “Monkey” have to realise (in my opinion) is that “The Legend of Monkey” isn’t made for you (generally speaking, not you personally) or me, it is made for ME- or the ABC ME generation specifically. While I can accept that there is a quality in the program that has to be criticised (and which you did), it’s not fair on the program to compare it with “Monkey” (not going to call it “Monkey Magic”), which was a product of its time. When the program was first announced, and when the trailer dropped, that’s what a lot of people started to do. From what I’ve seen of the trailer, my feeling is that “The Legend of Monkey” has more an air comparable to “Avatar” or “The Legend of Korra”, and if it works out that way, I’ll be well pleased. I’ll give it a try.

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