DMZ Review: Dystopian US War Drama Sets The Stage For A Transformative And Convicting Tale Of Love
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I first caught HBO Max series DMZ back in April and meant to write about it then, but finally managed to revisit it over the weekend. I have to admit though, that the show is only as long as one hour for all four episodes is one of its more inviting aspects. I never read the DC Vertigo comic, and so I don’t know if that is due to duration or simply Robert Patino’s own liberties in creating the series.
Nevertheless, the show is certainly solid in its format. Rosario Dawson leads the cast opposite Benjamin Bratt, and along with Hoon Lee, Freddie Miares and Jordan Preston with episodes directed by Ava DuVernay and Ernest Dickerson – neither of whom are strangers to television – and penned by Patino along with Westworld and Mad Men vet Carly Wray, and by the comic’s original authors Brian Wood and Riccardo Burchielli for a nice little touch of authenticity.
For all this and more, you get a four hour saga – what might as well be the equivalent of two 2-hour movies or maybe just a whole ass Zack Snyder film for argument’s sake – in which you’re immersed in a dystopian version of America that finds itself at war between the U.S. and the Free States. In the violent aftermath, a ceasefire has been installed with the island of Manhattan pegged as the center of demarcation between both sides. This is where we eventually meet our heroine, a medic named Alma Ortega (Rosario Dawson), just as she ventures in search of her long lost son, Christian, eight years after losing him the second civil war and the botched evacuation of the island.
Against all odds and any advice the skeptics have offered, Ortega (Dawson) journeys with the help of a coyote from outside the wall and into upper Manhattan, treading into potentially dangerous territory as multiple violent gangs have long since formed their own areas of control. Two of most prolific groups happen to the Spanish Harlem Kings led by Parco Delgado (Bratt), and Wilson Lin (Lee) who runs Manhattan’s Chinatown, and in the course of all this, there are several twists that come into play as Ortega finds herself in the peculiar position of mitigating the politics between both factions ahead of a pivotal election, all while balancing between her dangerous search for Christian (Miares), and her guardianship over an orphan named Odi (Preston).
DMZ lags only a few times, but there’s nothing crippling greatly with the pacing throughout the series as we come to learn about the characters and how they all intertwine as we follow Ortega’s journey. There’s high drama, intensity, and brutal action to boot, and next to Dawson’s place in the Star Wars universe via The Mandalorian and upcoming Ashoka, this is some of the best we have with Dawson leading such an emotionally-charged and high energy series. Her character is seen as the weakest link at first, with warning signs all over the place telling her that she’s not even going to survive the first twenty-four hour window she has to find her son, but what she lacks in fighting prowess and physical training, she compensates with intuition and sheer will, as well as gumption among the DMZ’s political elites.
Of course, her luck is really only as strong as her chances over time with war brewing betwen Pardo and Lin, and election that could mean life or death for a territory standing on unstable peace with an even greater and more deadly conspiracy cooking in the backdrop of it all. By the end, you get a solid finish to a short-lived series that could have just as easily been longer if Patino and his team probably chose. DMZ a fine watch with terrific action sequences and fight scenery by Spencer Mulligan, and a compelling, gripping and larger than life story that doesn’t bloat itself on the kind of politically-imbued monotony and cringey, overly jingoistic and bloated tropes that some DTV titles tend to deviate toward as if those filmmakers were trying to tap into a certain audience, which really isn’t how to do it.
DMZ is character focused and purely driven with human interest, and explosive action and suspense, and performed execellently by a cast of character who are palatable and are easy to empathize with and get behind. You’re invited to check it out on HBO Max if you’re new to the series, and as a noteworthy mention, if you enjoyed Hoon Lee, consider this your recommendation to watch the hell out of Banshee. And I mean all four seasons of it.
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Native New Yorker. Been writing for a long time now, and I enjoy what I do. Be nice to me!