TIME BANDITS – Season One

Showrunners Jemaine Clement (Flight of the Conchords), Taika Waititi (Thor: Ragnarok), and Iain Morris (The Inbetweeners) waste no time in their latest TV series, Time Bandits, to reveal the show’s greatest strengths: its whimsy and love of controlled chaos. This adaptation of Terry Gilliam’s 1981 fantasy adventure film of the same name follows Kevin (Kal-El Tuck), a nerdy preteen obsessed with history whose depth of knowledge goes unappreciated by all those around him. Whether it’s being rejected by his peers as they choose players for their team sports games, being the final pick even when paired against another young boy so beleaguered with injuries he looks like he shouldn’t be out of hospital, or having his parents shun his interests and condescend him, Kevin seems alone even when surrounded by other people.

It’s no surprise that the youngster finds refuge in the annals of history, and for as easy as it is to pity Kevin, it is very amusing to watch his feckless parents make no effort to hide their disdain over just about every word he utters. His brash younger sister Saffron (Kiera Thompson) is also eager to put distance between them. It’s even more hilarious to learn that when Kevin’s dream essentially comes true and he gets to explore different historical periods, the people who open up these worlds to him are similarly uninterested in his rambling anecdotes.

These figures are the Time Bandits, a motley crew that can be best described as the time travel equivalent of pirates. Headed by Penelope (Lisa Kudrow), the group’s aspirations are almost entirely centred on stealing as much loot as possible. Armed with a time map that allows them to traverse throughout the wide expanse of history, they come across many diverse civilisations and cultures. But not before accidentally tagging along with Kevin, whose room, for reasons unknown, is an important portal in this universe.

In its opening few episodes, this series strikes gold in combining Kevin’s (and the show’s) love of history and recreating different time periods with the total disinterest that pretty much every adult exhibits towards him. It is consistently funny to watch this protagonist’s interests being shot down again and again, with Kal-El Tuck providing an excellent performance as the youngster, who gamely ambles on despite being severely underappreciated. The bandits themselves are hilarious, with no weak links and clear motivations outlined for each of them.

While Time Bandits isn’t a masterclass in characterisation and could have benefited from more fleshed-out characters, it’s a joy to watch its awkward sense of humour being put to great use throughout the series. It knows exactly what it’s going for with regards to its funny moments, with some really great half-heartedness and defeatism from the group. They’re all rather useless, but prove themselves to be necessary components of an unlikely team along their many journeys.

Speaking of which, these timelines could almost be described as the show’s other main character, providing varied backdrops and entertaining, original plot lines for each episode. “Mansa Musa”, the title of the sixth episode and the name of one of its characters, whose real-life counterpart was one of the richest people in human history, was a standout from this season. Watching such an important figure take delight in the nerdy and awkward ways of Kevin was a joy to watch, and surprisingly satisfying given how disregarded this protagonist is by those around him.

While the series isn’t visually impressive, it’s worth commending the amount of background actors, side characters, sets, and locations that were shown throughout its duration. The cinematography is far from stunning, but these different visual landscapes evoke the wonder of being granted a window into different historical periods. While the bandits and his parents might look down on Kevin’s passions, this show never does, sharing its gleeful enthusiasm for the past in spades.

The cast are excellent, with Roger Nsengiyumva being the highlight performer from the bandits as the group’s expert in time travelling, who also doesn’t have a clue as to what he’s meant to be doing half the time. It’s great to see Lisa Kudrow in a kid-friendly role that still allows her to tap into her brilliant comic timing. Her character doesn’t possess the exuberance that made Phoebe such an iconic oddball in Kudrow’s most famous role, but there is still plenty of opportunity for the actress to shine as the bandits’ self-appointed leader (who simultaneously insists that the group doesn’t have a leader).

For as entertaining as Time Bandits is, it’s not a consistent experience. Watching the crew traverse Ancient Rome, the Mali Empire, and medieval England is highly entertaining, but the show falters the more it explores its general narrative more. This involves side characters gaining a more prominent role in the story, like Saffron, who also embarks on a time travel adventure. Initially, she pops in and out of the narrative in scenes so brief that it’s easy to forget all about her. These moments are highly entertaining, as it’s fun to watch a loud and bratty British pre-teen girl acting obnoxious to whoever she encounters throughout history. But she’s present so infrequently and for such a short duration in these early episodes that she keeps getting dropped into new scenarios without any adequate setup or explanation.

When Saffron finally becomes a key player in this story, she does so with a very promising start, where we learn that she has spent three years living with Neanderthals during The Ice Age, who have adopted her aggressiveness and turns of phrase. While Kevin’s obnoxious charisma vacuum of a sister is great in small doses, over time it becomes clear that she doesn’t have a personality outside of being brash and unwelcoming. As for the bandits, though often entertaining, their ineptitude does get stale at times.

The cherub characters and the two detectives trying to track down the bandits are severely underutilised, to such an extent that I forgot they existed for multiple episodes. Then, inexplicably, they are revealed to be important players in this narrative very late in the season, despite being incredibly forgettable in their rare appearances in Time Bandits. The detectives exhibit little to no personality and aren’t even given an entertaining quest, with their only scenes involving them standing around various places that Kevin and the bandits passed through. While I love the half-heartedness that the bandits express at times, showing how easily discouraged they can be, sometimes this series exhibits the same trait regarding its side characters and story.

Much of this could be explained by Charlyne Yi dropping out of production, who portrayed Judy, an ambitious bandit who aspired to be the leader of the group. (Yi alleged that they were frequently mentally and physically abused on set by a scene partner, causing them to experience a back injury and post-traumatic stress.) Judy’s abrupt end no doubt caused the show to undergo reshoots and led to new scenes and subplots being devised. While the end result isn’t incoherent or bereft of enjoyment, the last few episodes of Time Bandits—which don’t feature Yi—are easily the show at its weakest.

Aside from losing the formula of travelling to different time periods in its last two episodes, which was the show’s bread and butter, it misses out in a few ways on what made the series special. The wider plot of a god-like being pursuing the bandits for stealing his map, and an entity akin to the devil also hunting them down so that they can wield the time-travelling device, is fairly entertaining, but it isn’t what allows Time Bandits to exhibit its best qualities.

The humour in the show’s final three episodes is lacking, and its approach to time travel is also disappointing. In no way do I expect a thought-provoking, internally consistent meditation on travelling through time in a quirky and family-friendly show like this, but there’s one moment in “Home Again”, the series’ eighth episode, where it tries and fails to capture the mind-bending aspects of this process. It would have worked if the characters involved had undergone a particularly tumultuous experience, but instead the scene is flat and uninspired, where the viewer is subjected to a bland reiteration of something they have already watched.

The season’s ending is even worse, with a crappy switcheroo (technically two of them) concluding a lacklustre finale. There is still fun to be had even in this final episode, but not nearly as much as the potential that Time Bandits showed in its first six episodes. Not only does it gradually decline in quality from then until its conclusion, it’s also disappointing in how little intrigue is offered for future seasons. There is the promise of a new adventure, but no hook to make it feel all that worthwhile. Although it doesn’t bode well for the series’ future, if it can recapture the whimsical adventures of the first half of this season, Time Bandits will find itself on solid footing once more.

In terms of how it stacks up to the original film, this iteration of Time Bandits isn’t nearly as technically impressive, though that much could have been gleamed from the series’ trailer. Unlike its recent reimagining, the action scenes and lavish set pieces in Gilliam’s film are spectacular to behold, showcasing the creative wonders of the visionary filmmaker. Where this show improves on the ’80s fantasy film is in how it differentiates each of the bandits with distinct flaws and ambitions, while also adding more depth to Kevin to bring the character on a proper journey.

While I love Terry Gilliam’s creative ambitions, it’s undoubtedly a better choice to tone down the darkness of his film in this adaptation, particularly its out-of-left-field, nightmarish ending. It is very easy to forget about some of the film’s characters for long stretches amidst the chaos onscreen, and while this series also suffers from the same problem, it never makes that mistake with its main characters. It’s this quality that allows Time Bandits to still offer up entertaining moments in its lacklustre final episodes. Hopefully its flaws can be put down to the upheaval in the narrative caused by Yi’s departure, and that in its second season—if there is one—the series will return to its winning formula of awkward, clumsy characters and a palpable love of history.

UK • USA | 2024 | 10 EPISODES | 16:9 HD | COLOUR | ENGLISH

Cast & Crew

writers: Jemaine Clement, Iain Morris, Taika Waititi, Akilah Green, Melanie Bracewell, Tyrell Williams & Sam Bain (based on characters created by Terry Gilliam & Michael Palin).
directors: Taika Waititi, Jackie van Beek, Jeff Tomsic, Armagan Ballantyne, Yana Gorskaya, Iain Morris & Tim van Dammen.
starring: Lisa Kudrow, Kal-El Tuck, Taika Waititi, Jemaine Clement, Tadhg Murphy, Roger Jean, Nsengiyumva, Rune Temte, Charlyn Yi, Rachel House & Kiera Thompson.