Marco Polo Season 2 Review

Marco Polo (2015-)
Season 2 (2016)

Watch Marco Polo on Netflix
Created by: John Fusco
Starring:   Benedict Wong, Joan Chen, Zhu Zhu, Lorenzo Richelmy
Rating: TV-MA

Marco Polo Season 2 - Kublai Khan and Marco Polo

Plot: 
In this Netflix original, Marco Polo's adventures in Kublai Khan's court continue. In this season Kublai Khan faces threats against his throne from within and outside of his house.

Verdict
Marco Polo boasts amazing production values and a unique setting. It rarely rises above the typical story where everyone vies for power, but the season gets better as the concurrent stories begin to merge.  This is a show that makes you work for it. Story lines aren't as easy to follow as they should be. It's necessary to have a firm grasp on the events and characters from season one. The finale, episode ten, is easily the best episode, resolving the events of this season. It's good, but not great. Production value alone can't carry  a show.
It depends.

Review
You need to be familiar with season one to begin this season. Watching Netflix's recap of season one is not enough. I didn't really care for season one and didn't remember it, so this season started off confusing and slowly became more clear as I learned character names and plots and Google characters frequently.

After watching a string of subtitled movies, I appreciate this isn't subtitled. As difficult as this story can be to follow, reading it would have made it even worse.

The round eyed Marco Polo.

It's a great setting and the sets look authentic and rich, but it doesn't do anything to enliven the story. It just makes for a great backdrop. Marco Polo has the potential to make great characters but doesn't fully develop them. Marco Polo often feels contrived. As best I can determine from Wikipeida, he wasn't as critical to Kublai Khan as this show depicts. This season continually forces him to be important or hold a key piece of information, but he often seems superfluous.

Marco's backstory rarely comes in to play. Instead he's often the hero or savior of the plot. Kublai Khan is a cool looking character, but other than a bit of insight with episode two, he's mostly a figure head.

One Hundred Eyes, the warrior monk,  is one of the better characters, but that just relies on him being blind yet a great fighter.

Game of Thrones (2011) isn't that big of a stretch comparison, but Marco Polo lacks the compelling or hated characters. It also lacks the big spectacle, but that's probably a pure budgetary issue.

Episode nine is the big battle and episode ten brings the stories together and concludes them, before a teaser for season three ends this season.

The season opens with Marco Polo kidnapping a prince with a claim to the throne. Marco urges Kublai Khan to spare the child, while Kublai's son Ahmad argues the child must be killed. The theme of this season is who deserves the throne. Blood isn't always enough. Episode two is a standout, culminating with Kublai's decision on whether to spare the child prince or not.

Kudai, Kublai's cousin, is planning a takeover feeling that he deserves the throne and that Kublai stole it from his family. Pope Gregory X wants Kublai's uncle, a Christian convert, to renounced his alliance to the Khan.

This season is full of double dealing as many want to get to the throne. The empress wants Jingim's wife Kokachin to bear him a child. The empress takes matters into her own hands, and while Kokachin becomes pregnant, it may not be Jingim's.

Ahmad has his own plans of grandeur.

In episode seven Marco puts all the pieces together. Kublai Khan's adopted son Ahmad has conspired to overthrow him, bringing together various parties. Ahmad has had a plan since the beginning of the season and it's now coming to fruition. Ahmad want history to write about him as a conqueror, a poor boy who rose to power and toppled the Khan.

Marco encounters someone from his past who tries to turn him against Kublai, but it is not believable at all that Marco would turn. Even Marco argues that he has no reason to abandon his Khan.

Episode nine is the big battle. Kublai Khan enacts a genius idea to ignite the black powder Ahmad has amassed without harming his men. There's lots of fighting and swordplay.

Princess Kokachin story line never feels less than contrived.

Jingim's goes into labor. Kokachin has gone crazy with guilt over whether the child is Jingim's. It's a story line that always seems a bit silly, no matter how hard the season pushes it. Of course Kokachin admits to Marco the true patronage of the baby. Otherwise Marco would be a pointless character.

Ahmad's grand plan was to help Kudai win the kurultai over Kublai. Ahmad hoped to either draw Kublai away or expose Kokochin's secret. Kudai tells Kublai that he "can protect the throne or [he] can protect [his] family." The episode takes a few twists and turns. What will the Khan choose? Will Ahmad pay for his crimes or escape?

The final two episodes retroactively make the entire season better. It's not a bad show, but there are so many better shows out there, though none of them cover this period.