There was more narration than there was acting. That is a very bad sign. There was potential, but it was crushed into the dirt before the 1st episode was half way through. To many scenes of a character just walking in the short gaps between the narrations start and stop. It is like they thought they were making an audio book and forgot why they had any actors. I can't even say that the acting was bad (or good) because there really wasn't much to go on! What were the people making this THINKING?P.S. Dear IMDb, please stop being idiotic about how many lines I used, this is plenty long enough to say what needed said.

Couldn't watch this for long. I can forgive a low budget if the writing and acting are good, which is what I was hoping for here, but the narration and dialogue in Riese sound like something I would have written when I was a teenager. The actors seem like actors in cheap costumes, reading lines from cue cards. You can't see the production team, but you can tell that they are right there, just of sight. It is terribly obvious that you are watching grown men and women playing make believe in front of a camera — and without much feeling for it.But it was the narration that made it unwatchable: execrably redundant exposition, inserted between nearly every scene, pointless telling what we just saw, or are just about to see, like terrible comic book writing. I really lost my cool when an entire scene consisted of Riese walking through a set looking pensive, and the narrator telling us what she was thinking. Oh my. That's not a script.

When I started watching this I had low expectations because of the fact that I knew that it was a pretty low budget and the concept was pretty ambitious. It starts off with a clichéd take on a cliché which is a pretty good summary of the writing. There was a ideal vision that the writer wanted to convey but the delivery didn't always come off right. When it came to the style of the project there were a few things like the Darth Vader knock off that made me chuckle. Most of the Steam-punk clock-work equipment is just for show and is never explained or given a reason for being where it is. This hurt Riese only in that it detracted from one of the things that drew me toward it. I give this a 7 out of 10 because I found it enjoyable to watch despite it's flaws. The story itself is a solid fantasy and it is obvious that the cast and crew worked really hard on this project. If you like steam-punk at least give this a double take and keep your mind open when watching.

First of all, I'd like to say that I watched 7 eps. before writing this review and tried to like it. I was hopeful.My opinion. This show is garbage, it has no redeeming qualities at all what so ever. THE LOOK!?! It's horrible, in one scene they have thin sheets of paper as walls and these 3 to 4 foot gear silhouettes showing through. No reason why the gears would be there in this world, the only reason they are there is to try to cash in on "Steampunk" which is obviously something they don't understand. The look is mostly the same as any fantasy show with a low budget. Absolutely no interesting tech., no innovation as far as costumes, truthfully if someone showed up at a steampunk event in just about any of these outfits they would likely be met with a whole lot of meh and/or confusion. As far as the sets go, again, they are recycled fantasy sets with nothing worth seeing. Ever. Not one thing.The worst part of the show is how foolish the characters act. I'm watching it and thinking to myself "nobody would do these things. Why are they doing these things?" And then I realize they are making these stupid actions because the writing is horrible. When actors have to do things that no real person would do they lose the ability to be convincing actors. Stiff would be the description of the characters, and it's not simply due to bad acting, again, the writing is trite and ridiculous. I hated it and I hate the people who made it for trying to cash in on steampunk.