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Primal Season 1 Review

Primal is an adult animated action adventure series created by Genndy Tartakovsky that premiered its first season on Adult Swim in 2019. It is an extraordinary show.

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“Mira“

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Set in anachronistic prehistoric world, Primal follows the survival struggles of a caveman and a Tyrannosaurus that he befriends as they traverse this cruel world filled by a plethora of dangerous animal foes. I was blown away by this season. It has ten episodes and each one is at least very good or downright magnificent. The show has almost no spoken dialogue, but it does have immersive sound and it truly is an audio-visual masterpiece of animated storytelling.

Animation has always been an art form best suited for the silent treatment. The visuals should tell the story and this is exactly what happened here. I did not need any dialogue to be immersed by this show as the imagery was so striking throughout the entire season. The hand-drawn animation is classical in style, but still gorgeous to behold.

The character designs are somewhat crude, but fitting the narrative perfectly. The vistas are gorgeous and the scenery can become quite colorful at times. Couple that with not only incredible sound design, but also impressive scoring and you’ve got a feast for both eyes and ears. The score is particularly effective in the thriller and horror elements as it is very eerie and dramatic.

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Primal is obviously not grounded in any reality. Yes, the creatures are mostly based on their real prehistoric counterparts, but the show is extremely anachronistic. Not only do dinosaurs live with humans, but we also go through the ice age and also the final episode suggests more advanced humans living concurrently with the primitive cavemen. But once you get used to that anachronistic approach and realize that this is above all else a fantasy, you are in for a great time.

The series is a deft mixture of genres. It is fantastical in nature, but at its core an action adventure spectacle with strong horror and thriller overtones in certain installments. My only issue is the brutality of the show or the titular savagery. It was believable to a degree, but still it wasn’t really necessary for the series to be this grotesque, repulsive and frankly even impossible to watch in certain more horrible scenes fueled by cruel imagery of decomposing bodies and creatures being killed in countless atrocious ways. This excessive violence took me out of the experience and it should have been reduced at least slightly.

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Spear and Fang are these instantly iconic animated characters and one of the best pairings in the history of the medium. I cared so much for both of them that I genuinely could not take the dinosaur possibly dying in one episode, but thankfully he did end up surviving that ordeal. Their bond was wonderful and among the only human moments on an otherwise cruelly animalistic, savage show.

Spear and Fang is the name of the first episode that was instantly a heartbreaking, brutal and unexpected feat in storytelling. Who could expect that both of them would lose their entire family in a matter of minutes? This is probably the most tragic episode that instantly made me care for these two. River of Snakes was excellent in establishing their relationship and how the two weren’t initially overly synced-in.

A Cold Death is this very moving episode about the death of a wooly mammoth triggering a very violent response from his family. That final sequence was so touching and wonderfully believable as elephants and their relatives surely are among the most precious mammals in existence and among the most emotive. Terror Under the Blood Moon is one of the best episodes of the season that for the first time fully went into fantastical territory. The giant bats, the spider overlord and this long, angular cave of theirs – it was all instantly iconic imagery and amazing world building. It was the most mythological episode that was riveting throughout.

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Rage of the Ape-Men almost killed Fang, which was excruciatingly difficult to watch. The episode was way too brutal for my own taste, but also undeniably memorable in its arena setting. Scent of Prey thankfully brought the dinosaur back to life in a less eventful, but solid breather of an episode.

Plague of Madness is the weakest episode of the bunch. It was just too difficult to believe, especially in the final moments where the infected animal would just not die, even in a volcano. The episode was just horribly grotesque in its imagery, though its thriller momentum was obviously stupendously maintained throughout.

Coven of the Damned is one of the greatest television episodes that I’ve ever seen. Yes, it’s that incredible! The most human episode in a string of animalistic storylines, it depicts these primitive human witches who use dark magic to prolong their clan, but once one of them sees the shared painful history of our protagonists through these intriguing portals in time and space, she changes her mind and sacrifices herself in order to protect the two. It was so necessary for the show to give us a human counterpoint to all of the savagery on display, resulting in the most magical and most beautiful part of the season.

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The Night Feeder is overly mysterious and not explained at all in the end, but its ambiguity mostly worked as the episode’s atmosphere was one full of eeriness and suspense. Slave of the Scorpion is another masterpiece. This finale changed the game for the next season as it introduced a human woman who is much more advanced and tech-savvy than our main guy. That final ‘Pocahontas’-like sequence hints at things to come, which is more technology and I am all up for that.