It’s pretty tough to make a bad heist movie or show because, as a subgenre of crime media, it has everything in it. The very premise that the people involved have to steal something expensive and make a successful getaway is thrilling in and of itself. Then there’s the location from where said expensive item has to be stolen, and that’s where the problem-solving component of the heist comes into play, and you can make it as complex as you want, because if the difficulty level is high, the payoff is satisfying. Then you have the stakes, and it can’t be boiled down to just making it to the end of the heist alive. There has to be something more at play that’ll make us root for the characters involved and hope that they win. Then there’s the interpersonal drama, which can both heighten the stakes and complicate the plan, depending on how twisted the people involved are. And these are just the building blocks of a heist movie or show; you can add action, psychological horror, existentialism, and more on top of it. It takes a special kind of skill to end up with a boring mess, and that special skill has been displayed in Marked.
Steven Pillemer, Sydney Dire, and Akin Omotoso’s Marked, written by Dire, Wendy Gumede, and Charleen Ntsane, with the episodes being directed by Omotoso, Matshepo Maja, and Jono Hall, tells the story of Babalwa, a driver at a cash handling company called Iron Watch. She is extremely good at her job and is an expert at maneuvering through sticky situations because of her calm nerves. And while her boss, Zechariah, reaps the benefits of her labor, she continues to languish around the poverty line. On the personal front, things take a turn for the worse when her daughter Palesa’s cancer starts to act up, and the combined salaries of Babalwa and her husband, Lungile, fall short of paying for her treatment. When Babalwa asks Zechariah for help, she doesn’t get any. So, angry out of her mind, she turns to the dreaded gangster, Baba G, and vows to help him conduct a heist on Iron Watch if her share of the prize is enough to pay for Palesa’s medical bills. Sounds easy enough. However, with the introduction of budding gangsters, Zweli and Razor, and a cop with a personal vendetta, Kat, things get complicated. Whether or not Babalwa comes out on top at the end is what forms the crux of the story.
To be honest, Marked has a lot of good elements in it. Yes, the use of cancer-stricken kids always feels manipulative to me, but the way the writers use it as a means to explore Babalwa’s descent into darkness is pretty neat. They begin to question whether Babalwa is doing all this to save her daughter from the jaws of death or if she is using this whole operation as an excuse to unleash her dark side after years of suppressing it. The answers are messy, which is alright by me because it’s better to be messy than bland. There’s a somewhat pointed commentary on the connection between class and religion. The writers talk about how hopelessness drives people to rely on some divine power, which distances them from reality, thereby allowing the upper class to snatch every form of agency that the working class deserves to have. And by the time they realize that they should take matters into their own hands, it’s too late because the system has become anti-poor enough to label them as terrorists, criminals, or anti-social elements. What about the heist, though? Well, that’s the issue. Despite being centered around a heist, the writers are not all that interested in the heist itself.
I think the biggest issue Marked has is that it’s a show. If this was a movie, the correlation between the heist and the class commentary would have been potent. When that’s spread over six horridly paced episodes, it loses its impact. I mean, there are long stretches in the show where it seems like the creators have forgotten that they are building up to a heist. Then there’s the tonal whiplash. For the most part, Omotoso, Maja, and Hall keep things serious and somber because the mission is to save a cancer-stricken girl. But just when they have to double down on the direness of the situation, they try to add a splash of comedy. Humor is fine, but slapstick humor in a show that’s taking itself so seriously is really weird. The brief bits of action are alright. Visually speaking, it’s a decent-looking show. The actors are all talented, especially Lerato Mvelase, even though the exploration of their characters is one-note. But I can’t pin the blame on the actors because that’s the fault of the writers and directors, which brings me back to my issue with the serialized storytelling and how the showrunners confuse repetition with progress.
Despite spending six episodes of Marked with Babalwa, Zweli, Kat, Tebza, and more, you don’t really get a nuanced perspective of what these people are actually made of. What you learn in the last episode is not all that different from what you learn in the first one. And that seems like a waste of time and energy. On top of all that, the heist itself is limited to a small section of the finale. The show tells us that these guys are amateurs, anxious, desperate, and most importantly, they have never done a heist before. So, how do they succeed on their first try? I guess it’s a miracle because of their belief in God. If that’s something that’s alright by you, well, then this is the show for you. I didn’t like it at all. I like a nice setup, but I need a grand payoff. I can excuse budgetary constraints if the effort is palpable, but that finale just seemed like a cop-out of epic proportions. I appreciate the commentary on classism, capitalism, and morality. However, after using the word “heist” several times throughout your script, if you give me a big old nothingburger, I can’t be lenient and say, “Well, it’s worth a watch.” Hot take: there should only be heist movies, not heist shows. I know people love Money Heist, but that’s an overhyped dumpster fire, in my opinion. Marked is actually better than that, but that’s not saying much.
