TV Review: Helstrom
Tags: Horror, Demons, Possession, TV Review
After 2 previous failed attempts that didn’t go beyond Episode 4, we finally watched the full horror streaming series Helstrom! The people behind this really thought it was going to get renewed, didn’t they? Well, here are our thoughts on the first and only season of the show. Warning: SPOILERS.
The only Marvel comics we’ve read are X-Men ones, so we didn’t know what to expect. It looked like any standard horror movie involving demons, though this time the leads, Daimon and Ana Helstrom (Hellstrom in the comics), were themselves the children of a demon father from whom they got special abilities. There was a twisted backstory - the father was a serial killer who had the daughter with him for a while; the mother was possessed and had been locked in a psychiatric hospital for the past 2 decades - and demons doing what they usually do. Everything looked dark and depressing, and the show simply failed to grab us. This time, we googled about the source material and were surprised to find out just how different it was. After finishing the show, we can see that it did take things from the comics, though at the same time, it feels like one of those situations where the “adaptation” could’ve been turned into an original story. We’re not saying we wanted Daimon to wear a cape, however, some of the choices were boring and unoriginal. For instance, the father being a serial killer would’ve been scary in a cop show, but even with the reveal that his special dagger causes eternal pain to his victims, it feels like a downgrade from Marduk Kurios (or Satan, or any of the other possible fathers, because Daimon and Satana’s parentage keeps being retconned). Also, in the comics, the Hellstrom mother loses her mind after seeing her husband and their daughter performing an animal sacrifice and he then takes Satana to his corner of Hell where he teaches her dark magic. Marduk Kurios is still evil and a shit father, but that sounds substantially more interesting than making her assist him in his murder spree. To add insult to injury, Daimon and Ana’s father shows up in the very end looking like another possessed human (albeit a creepy one). Was the show saving the three-headed demon goat (the Hellstrom siblings have many fathers and MK has many forms, but we were kinda hoping for that one) for a hypothetical second season?
Then again, given the fake fire budget, we’re not that confident Helstrom could pull off a good three-headed demon goat. The closest the show gets to corporeal demons is the Keeper demon, whose one-eyed skull gains influence over Ana’s friend, Chris, and Basar’s first vessel. The Keeper’s full form is seen only once and briefly before it merges with Chris, who, apart from seeing an eye inside his throat and having a couple of symbols appear in his arms, maintains his human looks. Basar is the one who provides more demonic weirdness. He opens a many-toothed hole in his vessel’s torso into which he pulls unsuspecting humans to consume them, and survives losing most of that body. Basar’s “mouth” looks better from the front than the sides, and seeing someone get pulled in looks a little ridiculous. His demon mother, Kthara, who’s possessing the Helstrom siblings’ mother, Victoria, later rips out his heart which works as a toothy parasite to possess Daimon, who, for some reason, doesn’t get the torso mouth. Every other demon activity involves the tired, old possession gimmick, which is pretty disappointing coming from a Marvel property. It doesn’t help that the show avoids going deeper into its own lore and still attaches itself to the Church (Dr Hastings, who runs the facility where Victoria is kept and raised Daimon is a former nun, and Gabriella, his new partner, is a novice who reports to the Vatican), though it has The Blood, an original organization with a history with Daimon and Ana’s family. Neither of these are properly developed, and while Henry, aka Caretaker, a friend of Hastings’ and a member of The Blood who looks over Ana, says demon dad facilitated his younger brother’s possession, the show never even bothers to name him.
Another annoying choice was having everyone constantly talking about demon dad and then switch the focus to Kthara, who turns out to be the true mastermind behind the demonic activity and is trying to escape the psychiatric hospital. Yes, it’s a twist, but we also can’t help wondering why we should care, especially after her goal is revealed as wanting to be reborn in a flesh and blood body. Basar tells Gabriella, who was chosen as the vessel for the pregnancy, about his mother’s destructive potential and how her return will greatly affect Humankind. It all sounds very ominous… and also vague. Kthara talks about the war against the Oppressors, which, from what we got are the humans, but the show refuses to give more details. Henry says the Keeper demons, which are used to guard other demons, rebelled against their own kind, and that’s it. At times, it felt like the show expected the audience to already know these things. The dilemma of what to do with possessed humans - exorcize them and release the demon to possess someone else like Daimon, or keep them in a coma, thus trapping the demon in the unconscious body, like The Blood - is interesting, and the show does spend some time on it, but fails to deepen the discussion on both approaches, and The Blood ends up admitting they can’t go on like that. This is why they try to get the dagger that belonged to Daimon and Ana’s father, because in addition to condemning all those it kills to an eternity of pain, it can kill demons, too. Something else it can do? Turn into a really fake looking fiery spear. So, poor, nameless demon dad doesn’t even get a trident?
The characters are fine, though none makes a lasting impression. Ana’s present day rejection of her father’s lessons should’ve been a big moment for the character, but for some reason, the show decided to have her reject him in the past, too. In fact, wasn’t the whole point of her killings to stop people like him? Daimon never looked like he was going to go evil, either, no matter how much the show tried to convince us that it was a possibility. Gabriella’s story didn’t go as we expected, but since there won’t be more seasons, we’ll never know what would’ve happened with her. Unfortunately, she crossed the line into Too Dumb Too Live territory way too many times. We liked Chris becoming a Keeper, though we would’ve liked it more if he hadn’t been so unfazed by it. In the beginning he’s understandably freaked out, but then just accepts everything very well, and he wasn’t possessed. Of course, that also raises the question of what happened to the original Keeper demon. Did its mind just die? The main focus is the Helstrom family drama, and while we get to see Daimon and Ana repair their relationship and be reunited with their mother, considering how central to their issues their father was, their story is missing a very big piece. We know that the show was doing its own thing, but the decision to keep their father away until the very end is made weirder by the fact that, in the comics, the most important relationship is between the Hellstrom siblings and him. Earlier we mentioned how different Marduk Kurios (or any of the other possible Hellstrom fathers) was from the Helstrom version, but Kthara’s adaptation wasn't great either. Why make everyone less powerful when they’re meant to be seen as great threats? At least she was still evil and there was no attempt at having her and Victoria bond against demon dad. However, we think pushing what could’ve been an independent storyline into the Helstrom messy family was a mistake. Yes, Comic Book Kthara messes with both siblings, but if the goal was to explore their family dynamics and dark past, just use the father, FFS. Then, bring in different demons and expand that world. There’s no need to always connect everything and everyone. And is “Lily”, which is revealed as Kthara’s real name in the end, supposed to be “Lilith”? We know there’s a Lilith character in Marvel comics, but she and Kthara don’t seem to be the same entity. Many shows fall apart for going bigger; Helstrom apparently decided to go in the opposite direction and looks at risk of folding over itself into an ever smaller bundle.
THOUGHTS
When we posted about the show on social media, we wrote that Helstrom felt like a very long introduction to a bigger story that will never be told. Except, an introduction means explaining things, but instead the show would rather give hints than engage in proper world-building; because of this, nothing really stands out and most of it comes across as any other demonic possession story. Even Daimon and Ana’s struggle with their dark heritage isn’t much different than that of other characters with more mundane bad relatives. Also, they never seemed at risk of going full demon, no matter how much the show teased it. Helstrom could’ve benefited from being closer to the source material. Daimon Hellstrom, demonologist and occult detective, and dark sorceress Satana Hellstrom sound more interesting than their depressed TV counterparts (even if Comic Book Daimon does end up having very good reasons for being depressed), though Ana’s fashion choices were on point. All that said, we think the biggest problem with this show is that, like we wrote in the beginning, the people behind this seemed fully convinced they were going to get more than one season and so kept leaving stuff to be explained later. Big mistake.
By The Snarky Cats of Ulthar