Iron Fist Season 1, Episode 4 "Eight Diagram Dragon Palm" (USE SPOILER TAGS!)

[Kane52630]

Episode 4: Eight Diagram Dragon Palm



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[gohei_]

Okay I'm confused. [BLACKOUT]In DD it seemed that Madame Gao was part of the Triad. And in IF the Hand and the Triad are against each other and it also seems Gao is part of the Hand
Also, that was indeed a pretty cool hallway fight.[/BLACKOUT]

 

[Dasher10]

Opening scene was pretty funny

 

[Dasher10]

Loved the takedown of Martin Shkreli in the boardroom.

 

[Dasher10]

Colleen gets her traditional costume. Nice

 

[Web-Head]

Pretty Danny centric episode. I feel like the show is starting to really pick up now.

 

[Mister J]

For a second, I thought we were going to get jobbed out of that elevator fight scene.

Pretty Danny centric episode. I feel like the show is starting to really pick up now.

It did seem like things started moving toward something here.

 

[Heretic]

Putting my comments in spoiler tags...though to be honest...I have no idea why someone would be in a thread devoted to a specific episode of a tv series if they hadn't seen that episode and didn't want to be spoiled.

Spoiler

On his first day on the job, Danny betrayed the company...causing them to lose their entire R&D costs for a drug they likely spent years developing. This is a failure in his fiduciary responsibilities and he should be sued by the remaining shareholders.

On the plus side...after all the crimes he's committed thus far...all the people he has victimized for no real reason other than his own dangerous "naivete"...he finally found out that the TRUE hero of this series...Coincidence...has handed him a reason to earn his name in the title of the show.

 

[AlluAllu]

Spoiler

I on the other hand really took a liking to Danny there. It was a moment of pure escapism. We've had headlines about people raising the prices of drugs just to make more profit. It felt good to see the opposite, even in fiction.

Edit: Sorry for not using tags. I assumed that we were free to discuss openly, but now I actually read the title.

 

[Heretic]

Yeah...it was definitely topical, and I appreciate that in my sci-fi...just, like many aspects of this show...handled very clumsily.

 

[Pokkle]

It was a really good episode.

Spoiler

I loved the fight in the little hallway and in the elevator.
Madama Gao's role in the triad and in the Hand is intriguing.

 

[DarkShadow10]

Spoilers please

 

[ChrisBaleBatman]

Just wrapped this episode. I ****ing loved this episode. [BLACKOUT]I liked how on Harold's whim, the tide between Danny, Ward, and Joy just changed. I think it was very important for that change, especially with Danny and Joy reconnecting, that she had betrayed her brother and the company by handing Danny the key to his inheritance in the previous episode. It made the re-connection between her Danny believable after she had drugged him.

Colleen is awesome. My read is that it's not about the money, but that she's a warrior. She's a warrior, and warriors need to fight. Need to be challenged. The money is just icing, but taking on the challenge and putting her skills and experiencing battle...she needs that because she's a warrior.

I loved the big Danny fight scene in the hallway. The music was perfectly qued up, when the triad armed themselves with hatchets. I really like how they handled Danny's fighting style. I think the comparison will, aptly, be made to Daredevil in differences. I think it's interesting to look at, because while Matt is a trained ninja he's still got the boxer's background. I think the by comparison, it's great to see how Danny seems to expel so much less energy, and is so fluid. The elevator fight was cool, too.

The Martin Schrelli scene was awesome, too. And when you think about it, it makes perfect sense. Ward is cut from the same cloth. The idea of helping the company, and how the profit margin is important...I understand how he could say that Danny waved his majority dick around and sold it at cost as a bad thing. It looked like Ward didn't understand how someone who's not working for the company could see it as a good thing, and I liked it. I liked the reveal of Danny's tattoo, and the bits of his training we got. There was actually something tragic in hearing how his training went, and Joy saying it sounded like abuse was pretty potent.

If there's one lesson to learn from this episode. Never touch Joy Meechum. Never. Ever.[/BLACKOUT]

 

[ChrisBaleBatman]

Okay I'm confused. [BLACKOUT]In DD it seemed that Madame Gao was part of the Triad. And in IF the Hand and the Triad are against each other and it also seems Gao is part of the Hand
Also, that was indeed a pretty cool hallway fight.[/BLACKOUT]

I may be wrong here, but my understanding is...[BLACKOUT]that Gao wasn't part of the Triad, but only used that as a front. She pretended that she was Triad. And, it would make sense that she could get away with it because all of the Triad gangs would be afraid of The Hand. Not like anyone would step up. But, I'm only going off what I remember of her in Daredevil and what we got in this episode.[/BLACKOUT]

 

[TheVileOne]

Spoiler

Nothing about Gao's allegiances and alliances in the show make sense.

In Daredevil, she was part of the Wilson Fisk Cabal. However, she was listed as a separate party from The Hand, which was represented by Nobu. They appeared to be Yakuza but they were really The Hand. However, when she's introduced in this show, it's like she suddenly represents The Hand and she's a high ranking members.

 

[Solaire]

Just started episode 4.

Spoiler

Jimmy Pierce is one of the dudes that was fighting in the hospital that Foggy talked down right? Did no one else notice that, he isn't a big time player but the way they introduced him just kinda showcased it

 

[TheVileOne]

Spoiler

Not sure if that's supposed to be the same character, but it's definitely the same actor, former UFC and MMA fighter Jay Hieron.

 

[legendkillin]

Get our hallway fight scene. Can't wait for the Defenders to have theirs.

 

[TheVileOne]

It was a decent fight scene, but not exactly Daredevil Hallway or Stairwell levels of awesome.

 

[legendkillin]

It was a decent fight scene, but not exactly Daredevil Hallway or Stairwell levels of awesome.

It was the weakest of the fight scenes, would have preferred a faster pace fight.

 

[Murdock103]

Episode 4 was the strongest one so far. I actually really enjoyed the fight scene. Whilst its not mind blowing, I enjoy the different feel that it has from the Daredevil fights.

 

[kguillou]

This should have been the pilot episode. Seriously. They couldve skipped the past three and this wouldve been a proper introduction to the characters, the world and the story.

 

[Mike Murdock]

A much improved episode. I thought everything clicked much better. The corporate stuff worked decently with the rich vs. poor - the contrast of extremes continues to be noticable. I thought they could have made the pharmaceutical stuff less one-sided (the fact that it funds research to further new drugs is the obvious argument). These Netflix shows also are really pushing the skinny tie.

The ninja fight stuff is much better. I would like it to be more stylized and shot from more of a distance. It needs to be a different fight style than Daredevil (which I think it is to a degree), but it's not quite as good as Daredevil yet. I also find it interesting that this show seems to know it and doesn't put it as the capper for each episode.

On the plot development:

Spoiler

I'm not sure I like Madame Gao being part of the Hand (if that's the case). It seems she was separate from them. Plus, I like the different factions not all being together (I want a ninja war). I kind of got a Ninja Turtles movie vibe towards the end, but I enjoyed those scenes. I also liked the reveal at the end. I had noticed we never saw his tattoo, so I knew it was coming.

Four and a Half Stars.

 

[Lencho01]

Things seem to picking up a little bit with this episode.

 

[Elayis]

I got really excited when I saw the episode was directed by Miguel Sapochnik (even though I don't enjoy Game of Thrones anymore his episodes were the best of last season), but man this episode was a let down.

I'm not sure I watched the same hallway fight that everyone else did. The choreography and sound design were terrible, the editing was choppy and the music made it borderline farcical. It was a joke.

And I don't understand why the showrunners build things up for reveals when they don't make narrative sense. [BLACKOUT]Why keep the identity of the ninja that killed the Triad thug a secret? It doesn't add anything to the emotion of the scene to not know who killed him (even though I had already guessed who it was as soon as Harold asked for a second favor.[/BLACKOUT]

And the "ripped from the headlines" bit with the drugs was not handled well at all. I can understand why it was done but it wasn't written very well.

This is a very uneven show, just like every other Netflix series, but unfortunately Danny isn't as charismatic as Matt or Jessica or Luke. Maybe it's Jones' difficulty with the accent, maybe it's the direction, but half the time it just sounds like he's reading his likes from a script, not acting.

I'm sticking with the show because I want to see how it ends and whether it ties into Defenders, but otherwise I'd drop at this point. Definitely the weakest of the shows so far.