Marton Csokas says 'fusion' of martial arts and the post-apocalypse drew him to 'Into the Badlands'

NEW YORK, Nov. 15 (UPI) -- New Zealand-born actor Marton Csokas says he is happy to star in the martial-arts drama Into the Badlands because it is unlike anything else on American television.

"That is what is attractive about the show," Csokas recently told UPI during a roundtable interview with reporters at New York Comic-Con. "It is a fusion of cultures and costume and ways of behaving and thinking and television is becoming more intelligent in that way."

The series is set in a post-apocalyptic, feudal society where guns are outlawed and seven rival barons rule with the help of armies of trained assassins. Csokas plays Baron Quinn, while Daniel Wu plays Sunny, his trusted adviser, and Orla Brady plays Quinn's wife Lydia.

"[My character] is one of seven barons. The idea is that -- and I think the tag is -- 500 years or so in the future, nowhere in particular in America, everybody was at the mercy of everybody else and, so, they decided to form some kind of foundation," Csokas explained. "And in the future sort of a Japanese fuedal system is formed and each of [the barons] looks after whatever resource -- oil, water, gold -- and Quinn's is opium. So, I think he is doing his best to survive in that particular world and he has a family. There are people who want to usurp the kingdom, if you like... and he does his best to maintain order and control and power in order to create stability."

Into the Badlands is to premiere Sunday night on AMC.

Csokas, 49, is known for his work in the Lord of the Rings franchise, as well as the films The Bourne Supremacy, Kingdom of Heaven, Alice in Wonderland, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, Sin City: A Dame to Kill For and The Equalizer.