Okay then. Well. I watched the premiere episode of Deadly Class. And well. Hmm.

How do you review a show that is a cross between Deadpool and The Breakfast Club, with no preppies or jocks, just the rebels and the assassins?

Ostensibly, the show is about a school for kids to become assassins. I don’t know why I expected a slightly lighter touch, maybe like Kingsman or Deadpool, or a Hogwarts rip-off where everyone’s a Slytherin. Nope, it’s dark, it’s moody, it’s all the problems of being a new kid in a tough high school except everyone’s in a gang capable of killing you if it wasn’t against the rules. Although some of the rules are more like guidelines.

Enter the main character, Marcus, who is rumoured to have burned down an orphanage with 12 people inside. On the run from the police, with nowhere to go, he is offered a place to stay at a secret school. Master Lin, head of the school for the Deadly Arts, wants to give him a home and a purpose, or at least train him not to be prey. The opening scene shows a history class talking about WWI starting with the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and when someone passes a note in class to the new boy (Marcus), Master Lin breaks her nose with his walking stick and continues on with the lesson. This is not your typical high school, obviously. The rest of the episode is him hooking up with the unaffiliated students, trying to find his way through the hierarchy without getting killed his first day, and working on his first assignment — to kill someone who should be killed, hide the evidence, and provide proof.

Marcus is played by Benjamin Wadsworth and he’s a bit uneven in the episode, ranging from wide-eyed scared kid to tough guy who will stand up to anyone. Decent but hardly great acting. Master Lin is played by Benedict Wong, and if he ever leaves behind the role of being the Inscrutable Asian, I’ll find out if he can act. Adequate but not earth-shattering.

Other students pop up to keep life interesting — Saya, a Yakuza kid; Petra, unaligned goth chick; Maria, a gangbanger’s girlfriend; Willie, a pacifist hiding in the school; and Billy, a weird possibly gay kid, who is willing to align with anyone who would take him. All of them are decent actors, none of them are given much to do.

Again, I have no idea how to rate the show. I liked it, but it is pretty dark and confused. I would not want to bet on renewal though, so I’ll go with the original prediction of CANCELLATION.