Marvel's Iron Fist: Season 2 - Episodes 4-10 Review
Looking back over the season as a whole, the biggest problem with Marvel's Iron Fist as a show is that is seems to be in constant contradiction with itself. It's a superhero show, but Danny Rand rarely uses the Fist and doesn't have a superhero costume. It's a street-level vigilante show, but Danny Rand has a superpower that can take out almost anyone trying to attack him, and can also fend-off any financial issues because he's the son of a billionaire. It's a martial-arts show, but the series tries to stray away from the cultural influences of traditional martial-arts stories and incorporate the superhero and vigilante elements. A series like this needs a certain amount of focus to really work, and Marvel's Iron Fist just doesn't do that.
What would I do to improve this season? Firstly, give Danny Rand a proper Iron Fist costume. You don't need something 100% comic-accurate, but you need something. After a while, he looks a bit daft with just a yellow scarf covering his mouth. Also, stop finding ways to prevent Danny from using the Iron Fist! That's what we're all here to see, that's what the show is named-after, and that's his defining super-power. If Danny Rand doesn't have the Iron Fist, the story stops dead. That's not to say you can't explore an Iron Fist-less Danny, but across both seasons, he seems to not have the Iron Fist more than he actually does. If Danny kept the Iron Fist during the transference with Davos, then at least we could've seen two Iron Fists battling it out. Instead we just get a load of episodes with an injured Danny moping about and Davos going "yay, I've got the Iron Fist! Now I need to be evil". Davos never really develops over the course of the season, he just becomes really evil for no apparent reason.
Funnily enough, if Danny keeps the Iron Fist in Season 2's story-line, you actually manage to build-up a sense of narrative momentum. No longer is Danny just sitting around, but he's now evenly-matched with Davos, providing a sense of tension to the fight scenes. Not only can the action choreography go to some extraordinary places, but you can really show off the visual effects work. Nothing too big, but given what they achieve in the series as it is, they could've afforded it. Maybe Danny decides to give Colleen the Iron Fist to help in the fight against Davos, or maybe Colleen discovers it for herself with Misty Knight. The possibilities open up, and that drastically improves the narrative and pace, because ultimately the pieces are there for a terrific story, but Marvel's Iron Fist: Season 2 never fully utilises them to its advantage.
But alas, we'll never get to see a great season of Marvel's Iron Fist. The show's been officially cancelled, making it's epilogue feel a bit redundant in retrospect. Danny Rand and Colleen Wing will probably return in some way, shape or form, but not in this solo series - and, if we're being honest, that might be for the best. Even when Marvel's Iron Fist improves itself for a second season, it's still not great, and far from the quality of the other Marvel-Netflix shows. Still better than Marvel's Inhumans though.
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