What is this new stunning series from Arte?

ON THE TV PROGRAM. Tonight Arte is broadcasting the first episodes of Machine, an action series that is as unusual as it is explosive…

machine. It seems that the title of the new series that Arte will broadcast from Thursday April 11 at 8:55 p.m. was inspired by its creator Fred Grivois and Emmanuel Macron’s advice to young people: “Read Karl Marx”, very easy ! With his desire to explain class struggle and leftist ideals to teenagers in general and his children in particular, the director wanted to find a “playful way” to approach the subject. The result: an unusual and explosive series with Margot Bancilhon (particularly seen in Please recently) and stars JoeyStarr, who stands out in the current TV show and was awarded at the last Séries Mania festival in Lille.

The pitch from machineIt is the story of a young fringe woman (Margot Bancilhon), a kung fu specialist who is actively wanted by the army’s intelligence services for a dark reason. To hide, she returns to her hometown, where she hopes to seek refuge with her grandmother incognito. She learns that she died while she was away and will still stay in the deceased’s apartment and find work in a household appliance factory. Here this lone warrior is confronted with the social struggle: the company recently purchased by a Korean industrialist is in turmoil. There the young woman meets a loudmouth worker, JP (Joey Starr), a former drug addict and follower of Karl Marx, who gives her his nickname: “Machine”. Thanks to the revolt brewing at the factory, the new recruit reveals surprising combat skills…

Scarier than a horror film

In addition to his anecdote about Emmanuel Macron’s quote, Fred Grivois said some great things about it machine at a press conference. In particular, he explains that he originally wanted to make a horror series, but this became clear to him when he saw Stéphane Brizé’s film The law of the market in particular, that “the fear of the French was not of mystical things, but of losing one’s job.”

Far from Brizé’s ultra-realistic production (one could also think of Ken Loach), here he reaches into the hallucinatory repertoire of Tarantino, with a script and action scenes that come out of nowhere. Because Machine, with a dark look under her dreadlocks, is more of a Kill Bill or Millennium heroine, between Beatrix Kiddo and Lisbeth Salander, experienced in martial arts and in handling weapons, who therefore has enough to make the villains drool bring.

What are the opinions on Machine, the Arte series?

Most convinced is Ouest-France, which appreciates this machine is exactly “the perfect combination between Karl Marx and Kill Bill”. “Fun, political and unconventional,” writes the daily, “the series shows its amazing mix from the first minutes.” “You definitely have to like offbeat humor, Kill Bill-style fights and the political speeches of Karl Marx , to honor this crazy original novelty”, but this “French creation that goes a hundred miles an hour, served by a good cast” it is ultimately a “daring mix of genres”. […]So wonderfully executed that we’re begging Arte to give this crazy gem a second season.

The worst is the New Obs, who for his part judges that “machine goes pschitt.” “Despite the charisma of Margot Bancilhon and JoeyStarr, everything sounds wrong in this bad case,” writes the weekly newspaper, adding that “the scenario, like the dialogue, is ponderous, the action scenes are tedious and the borrowings from annoying pop.” culture (particularly the character of the mentor, which was taken over by Stick, the character created by Frank Miller), the poor direction and the incredible supporting cast.