I put off watching The Inhumans because I heard it was, in a word, awful.

It's not.

Don't get me wrong, it's not the best Marvel property to hit the small screen. I would easily place Agent Carter, Daredevil and Jessica Jones ahead of it. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., too. But it's not terrible. And, at a mere eight episodes, I don't feel I wasted an unreasonable portion of my life watching it.

The action plods at times, and some of the acting is wooden. We sort of learn about the various characters' powers, but we don't really get to know the characters themselves. It's certainly not the best dialogue I've heard, either. Additionally, the series presents us with an entire culture that lives in a hidden city on the moon, but doesn't provide much to show us what life there is like, or how it developed.

And yet, once started, I wanted to finish the run.

I'll confess, I have a soft spot for the Inhumans. Growing up, I didn't have a lot of comic books -- it was a passion I developed sometime in my 20s, I think -- but among my small collection I had an issue of the Fantastic Four that featured the Inhumans, and I was fascinated. It was the only time I ran across them until much, much later, and I found them ... unusual. They didn't fit the mold of the Avengers, X-Men and various other Marvel and DC heroes I knew. Later, as an adult, I never really delved into their varied appearances, but that one issue from my childhood remained lodged in my memory. And this brief miniseries, while not mirroring my memories all that closely, still brought those characters to life in a way that I found entertaining.

What I found most interesting about the show was that the king's power-hungry brother Maximus (Iwan Rheon from Game of Thrones) was unquestionably evil. He was ruthless and had no qualms about killing others -- including family members -- to achieve his aims. But he was also ... kind of right. His stated goal of freeing the people from an inflexible caste system was ultimately selfless, even though he stood to benefit by seizing the crown. Meanwhile, his more "heroic" and noble kin, the rightful monarchs Black Bolt (Anson Mount) and Medusa (Serinda Swan), among others, were supposed to be the good guys here, but they had done nothing to help the lower classes and even acted harshly to keep oppressed citizens in their place.

So who was the real villain here?

At the end of the day, the plot is actually pretty good. The look of the characters isn't terrible, although some of the costumes are a little wonky. And I don't think the actors are bad at their jobs, but it definitely feels like the production was rushed. With a little more polish, this could have been awesome.

It's obvious some reviewers based their opinions solely on the first two episodes, which isn't a fair judgment. It's a shame the negative buzz killed any chances of a second season because the opportunity for the Inhumans to interact with other Marvel properties had buckets of potential for better storytelling.