Legend of the Seeker: Let's all prance around New Zealand with a sword

I've been debating what show to start with, and then the other night I was babysitting  (hi Ali!) and started rewatching Legend of the Seeker on Netflix, and I was all: BINGO.  (Sidenote:  I really wish Netflix Instant didn't have that "recently watched" feature, because when you have terrible taste like me, you'd really rather *not* be reminded that you spent an entire day watching nothing but Saved by the Bell, Dawson's Creek, and Drop Dead Diva.  Or in this particular case, when you watch something stupid on someone else's Netflix, and then they'll know that the person with whom they entrusted their child watched several episodes of a show my mom would call "dippy.")

But back to Legend of the Seeker.  Y'all, I love this show so much it's embarrassing.  It's a fantasy show (based on a series of books that I haven't read, and let's face it-- probably never will) where the good people always win, and the bad people helpfully wear black and blood-red, in case you didn't know they were EVIL.  It's entirely possible that the books are well-crafted and nuanced explorations of good and evil in a psuedo-medieval setting, but the show itself is pretty much an anvil in TV form.  People say things like "We're fighting for HOPE!" and "You can't kill a woman for speaking her mind!" and "Killing this baby would be EVIL!"  The stakes are so low, it's comforting.  The main characters will never die, the bad guys lose (unless it's the first half of a two-parter), and by the end of the episode you've learned a helpful lesson like "Freedom of speech is good" or "Killing babies is bad, even if they might grow up to be evil."  It's not like Game of Thrones, where someone can accidentally get her dad beheaded.  The worst that will happen is a character you met at the start of the episode will die by the end, but you pretty much knew that would happen anyway.  I think a lot of my affection for the show comes from the fact that it's a good, old-fashioned Saturday afternoon action-adventure show, and exactly no one on it thinks they're making Mad Men.  But on to the characters!

Meet Richard:
Richard is your basic "reluctant hero with a quest" and he makes this face a lot:

He's also very bad at buttoning his shirt.  Well played,

costumers.  Well played.

Richard carries a sword called the Sword of TRUTH (capitalization mine, because that's how I say it in my head), and is the first "Seeker" in a thousand years, which means he's really good at fighting and also maybe has magical powers if the episode needs some deus ex machina action.  People are constantly recognizing him because he carries the Sword of TRUTH, which looks like a regular sword to me, so I don't get how that works.  Richard spends most of his time whining about his mission and then accepting it, only to revert back to reluctant hero at the start of the next episode.  He also takes a lot of flying leaps into battle, which look awesome, and has totally anachronistic views about free speech for a dude from an alternate-universe Middle Ages.  He's completely in love with Kahlan.


Hi Kahlan! (pronounced Kay-lin, which makes no sense to me):

There's no wind-- her hair is just naturally like that.

She's Richard's spiritual guide and also his bodyguard, and she wears a pretty white dress that is totally impractical for fighting, if you ask me.

                      It also has a hood for formal occasions and impromptu Eminem rap battles.

Kahlan is part of an all-female order called the Confessors, which means she can tell when people are lying and also magically compel people (maybe just men? I don't know if it works on women) to be her slaves.  Once compelled, you lose your sense of self and can't lie to your Confessor.  This is alternately portrayed as a huge, complex moral dilemma and as no big deal if she uses it battle.  Which she does.  All the time.  Anyway, her powers are so dangerous that she and Richard can never be together, because if he gets accidentally compelled during sex then he won't be the Seeker and their world will be DOOMED.  Naturally, this leads to lots of DRAMA and LONGING, and it's excellent.  Despite the actress playing Kahlan being far better at acting than the guy playing Richard, they have nice chemistry.  Their  unrequited love is probably my favorite part of the series.


This is Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander, which sounds like a name a 13 year old would create for a sorcerer:

I call him Dumbledalf.

He's a Wizard of the First Order, which is apparently a big deal and means he can shoot fire from his hands.  He's another one of Richard's guardians, and is sometimes helpful but usually just serves as exposition and comic relief.  He's not very funny, and I sort of hate him.


Meet Darken Rahl, your evil overlord:

Severus Snape?  Is that you?

He's your basic Big Bad, and tried to have Richard killed as a baby in an event that is not at all parallel to Herod's slaughter of innocents in the bible, no sir.  Darken Rahl spends a lot of time lounging around his castle, cursing that pesky Seeker and wondering if his name could possibly sound any more evil. (Spoiler alert: it can't.)  He also has fabulous hair.


In the second season (of two), Cara shows up:

Cara is the whore half of the virgin/whore

dichotomy that is clearly at work here.

Cara is a reformed Mord-Sith, who are Darken Rahl's evil group of, uh, dominatrixes.  She carries a not-at-all-phallic club that induces extreme pain in anyone that touches it, including herself.  There's actually a pretty weird/interesting depiction of women in this universe, in the sense that women are portrayed as having far more self-control and innate morality than men. (Careful: the fall from that pedestal is really gonna hurt.)  Cara's main job is to be really good at fighting and to inspire an awful lot of slashfic involving her and Kahlan.




That's basically it for characters.  There are very few long-term recurring characters, which makes it easy to follow along.  Again, Game of Thrones, this ain't.  But, if you feel like some low-stakes action-adventure with a heaping dose of angst from unrequited love, it's pretty great.  Plus, it's only two seasons so it's not like it's a major investment of your time.

Verdict: Terrible-Awesome.