Shanty Town

Shanty town helps to offer an insight into the lives of the corrupt, with a plot that gives it a strong base. Filled with impeccable acting and nerve wracking moments. Shanty Town is a must see. It starts off fiery but is perfectly paced, as the show goes on you see that.

Each character has a reason for doing what they do and their personal goals and vendetta all collide. Episode one gives us a teaser of what is to come and the further episodes help to build on that in as much as the gore or nude scenes may not be too everyone's liking it is certainly a key component of the show as it helps us understand the world of Shanty Town.

This series opens with a fast and dark sequence of action scenes, giving a semblance of a promising start, but instead of building on this start, Shanty Town delves into a laden exposition that masks as the crux of the plot. This series never regains the thrill and urgency that the opening scene has.

Shanty Town is all about the male gaze, and is shameless in its portrayal. Female characters are degraded and objectified, and the excuse of it being a true attempt at showing the lives of sex workers is flimsy at best.

Shanty Town also employs gore and violence, but this isn't done to promote the plot, but is provided for shock factor. It's almost as if the creators decided to shoe in as much violence as they could fit in.

The plot of Shanty Town is a shabby patchwork of various stories and subplots that only help propel the runtime but not the story. Shanty Town trails to a very unsatisfactory end, with copious plotholes.

The only saving grace of Shanty Town is in its brilliant cast. Chidi Mokeme, Ini Edo, Nse Ikpe Etim, Richard Mofe Damijo, Nancy Isime, Shaffy Bello, and others try their best with the poorly developed story they were given to work with.

Shanty Town can best be described as a meal ruined by having too many cooks, the cooks in this instance are the towering subplots and themes that were incorporated.

There are some key issues that prevent this series from accomplishing its goals and here they are broken down:

1, Action sequences They are baaad. One move somehow is chopped into 4 different cuts with outrageously bad sound effects. This would be find on its own but in the opening salvo there are literal anti-tank mines going off all over the place seemingly for no reason!

2, The premise It suffers from horrible character development and a lack of agency from any of the supposed leads. Instead of having one or two characters drive the story, you have a mess of underdeveloped would be protagonists all pulling in different directions. By the end you're as confused as you were when the E1 started.

3, Effects The sound doesn't work, if anything it irritates you and pulls you out of whatever engagement you're able to cultivate - but it pales in comparison to the mediocre visual effects. I will concede this is a Nollywood film so you're not exactly expecting much but even by those standards it manages to disappoint.

If you can get over those issues, which I had a hard time doing then you're in for literal torturous viewing.

Shanty town is a fantastic movie in general with beautiful story line, fantastic casting and fantastic roles interpretation I love shanty town and it is the best movie from nollywood right now, i will like to recommend that everyone should see this beautiful work.the writers, producers, directors and every member of the cast and crew brought their A game on. Chidi mokeme immersed himself in that character, you'd most likely forget what he looks like in real life. Lost in the character, perfect performance. The movie has a good message and a relatable lesson. Will give it 10/10 Nollywood to the world.

I didn't expect this series to be so good. In terms of production, visuals, plot, script, acting has improved massively from the old days of BEN channels. Nollywood is like Bollywood to be a force to be reckoned to Hollywood. However, I was thoroughly entertained with unexpected plots and suspense. The harsh reality on how power can corrupt absolutely from the political arena, which can correlate to real life situation. The A-class cast from The King of Boys such as Sola Sobowale really smashed it. The series does provide a unique twist, with the underground black market, and forced prostitution which correlates on how there are more slaves in the world than transatlantic slavery with political involvement in the continent of Africa. However, it shows the other dark side of prostitution, which is different to sex workers who really enjoy their trade with individual choice to make a living.