A Tartakovsky Primer: a review of Primal
| Created by | Genndy Tartakovsky |
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| Story by |
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| Directed by | Genndy Tartakovsky |
| Voices of | Aaron LaPlante |
Genndy Tartakovsky is, arguably, the best known name in contemporary animation in the west. His efforts include the Powerpuff Girls, Dexter’s Laboratory, Hotel Transylvania, and Star Wars: Clone Wars.
But the show he is most often praised for is Samurai Jack, which showed a side of Tartakovsky not evident in his more ‘commercial’ shows. Jack was famed for its beautiful backdrops, a magnificent sound track, and a considered, reflective storytelling that often relied on little or no dialogue and an unhurried pace. In children’s animation this was unheard of, and it ensured a broader audience.
Jack was considered a purer form of Tartakovsky story-telling, one in which he wasn’t constrained by the rapid-fire gag-a-second action-based nature of most cartoons.
If Jack is, indeed, a ‘purer’ Tartakovsky, then Primal is the distilled essence of Tartakovsky, one in which the audience is adults, and there are no restrictions on the subtlety of the story-telling, no pulling of emotional and intellectual punches.
The story premise is that a caveman, an Alley Oop-like figure referred in the studio where the show is made as “Spear” and his sometimes-ally, a tyrannosaurus rex referred to as “Fang.” In the show itself, neither character is named, for the simple reason that there is no dialogue at all.
We meet Spear in the first episode where he is spear fishing. Fang shows up and steals his catch. Spear, of necessity pragmatic, resumes trying to capture food for his family. Later in the show, he shakes off the pesky creature, until near the end, when he is approaching his home. He hears a roar, and arrives to find Fang menacing his woman and their two young children, a boy and a girl. Fang proceeds to kill and eat them in front of Spear’s eyes. (This is definitely not a show you want to share with your five year old daughter, in case I hadn’t already made that clear.) Spear gives chase, seeking revenge. Fang gathers her own two youngsters and flees into the path of a full-grown male T-rex, who proceeds to eat her children.
Spear is ready to move in and kill her, and sees, in a brilliant show of subtlety, that she is, in her own way, grieving. Their eyes meet, and an unlikely and very uncertain bond is formed.
Yes, shows in which dinosaurs and humans co-exist are usually very silly. Tartakovsky could have picked a sabre-tooth tiger or a woolly mammoth, but he elected to go with a young female T-rex. Trust the story-teller, especially when he’s a masterful one like Tartakovsky.
While the show doesn’t showcase some of Tartakovsky’s strengths (typal depictions of all human cultures, strong dialogue when needed) it does have his magnificent physical environments, and the deliberate and non-condescending narrative style for which he is famed.
First five episodes now on Netflix, five more to come this year.