Netflix's Warrior Nun lacks the fun of its title

The Hollywood Reporter

The drama series loosely based on Ben Dunn's early 90s manga-style comic book series Warrior Nun Areala trades the source materials' dedicated heroine, Shannon Masters, for a waif who has no interest in serving the Catholic Church after a degraded childhood in holy care, says Robyn Bahr. "Thematically, Warrior Nun is nothing you haven't seen before, and aesthetically, nothing you ever want to see again," says Bahr. "Bleak, dour and trudging, the series contains none of the kitschy, blasphemous fun of its title." Bahr adds: "Warrior Nun is another entry in the teen feminist occult fantasy genre, also populated by Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Motherland: Fort Salem and the late, great Sky One drama Hex, and each show no doubt looks upon Buffy the Vampire Slayer as Mother Superior. Ultimately, however, they're all male fantasies of muscular, hot-girl matriarchy, Warrior Nun just being the first to prove that sour-faced warriors are boring no matter their gender."

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• Warrior Nun suffers from inconsistent writing, poor pacing and a lack of originality: The Netflix series also suffers from "creator Simon Barry’s desire to hold too much back for future seasons," says Samantha Nelson. "Season 1’s 10 episodes zip around between a huge number of characters who each have mysterious, painful backstories, but they’re mostly thin archetypes. The most time is spent on Ava, who seems the least deserving of both the halo and the show’s attention."
• Warrior Nun is basically an ecclesiastical John Wick: "Come for the fun, bizarre coming-of-age-story about a girl unwittingly turned into the vessel for a magic Halo," says Emma Stefansky, "but stay for the truly impressive fight choreography."
• When it begins to click Warrior Nun transforms into its own distinct experience rather than simply a derivative facsimile of past butt-kicking shows