This month was all about The Dark Crystal and Shakespeare, though thanks to having a fortnight of annual leave, I also managed to churn through several shows that I’ve been meaning to get to for ages (the first season of The Terror, the third season of A Discovery of Witches, and The Tudors).
Altogether, I got through a huge range of stuff, from my usual Babysitter Club instalments, to long-gestating Dark Crystal supplementary material (most of which was in graphic novel form), to a couple more girl detectives, to all the drama and tragedy and comedy that the Bard has to offer.
In short, a good reading/viewing month, and if it took ages to post this one, it’s because I’ve been nursing a head cold that just won’t go away.
Much Ado About Nothing (Delacourte Theatre Stage)
I’ve been meaning to settle down and watch this one for a long time, ever since gif-sets started popping up on my Tumblr dashboard. The problem was that until quite recently I couldn’t find a decent recording of it anywhere, though Great Performances finally hooked me up (thanks guys!)
Performed in front of a live audience at the open-air Delacourte Theatre Stage in Central Park, which hosts free Shakespeare in the Park every summer, this staging of Much Ado About Nothing sets the tale in Aragon, Georgia, in the spring of 2020, and made beautiful use of the twilight slowly fading into night.
Much Ado is my favourite Shakespeare comedy, and Benedick/Beatrice are surely my favourite Shakespeare couple – I believe in their attraction, love and devotion in a way that’s impossible with any of the other Love at First Sight couples that comprise the rest of the Bard’s repertoire, for much of the same reasons that Aladdin and Jasmine are my favourite Disney couple: they demonstrate the gamut of emotions required for a successful relationship (trust, respect, fun, understanding) in a limited period of time, which cements in the viewer the surety that these two characters are made for each other.
But that’s neither here nor there. This modern-day take on the play unfolds on the grounds of a Georgian brick house, where a family gathering is taking place, and patriarch Leonato is welcoming soldiers back from the war. Of course, it’s unclear what war these guys have been fighting in this context, but the production leans into its contemporary setting by having a Stacey Abrams banner on the house façade and the returning soldiers carrying political placards. Maybe it’s a metaphorical battle.
In any case, Leonato’s niece Beatrice and lauded soldier Benedick pick up their “merry war” from where they left off, sparring and slinging insults at each other, while young Claudio casts eyes on Leonato’s daughter Hero and immediately falls in love. By the end of the night, Don Pedro will have arranged the engagement between Claudio and Hero, and come up with a plan that will convince Beatrice and Benedick that they're in love with each other.
But there’s a spanner in the works, in the form of Pedro’s younger brother Don John, who is a bastard in both status and personality. He wants to break up the happy couples, and not for any particular reason – he’s just a dick.
This leads to the most harrowing scene in any Shakespeare play (short of what happens to Lavinia in Titus Andronicus) in which Hero is accused of unfaithfulness by her husband-to-be on her wedding day, at the altar, after which almost everyone turns on her, including her own father. It’s only by the diligence of several security guards that the truth is revealed and Hero’s dignity restored – but as any longtime fan will tell you, the most touching element to all of this isn’t that Benedick turns on his friends for the sake of Beatrice, but for Hero, a woman he barely knows. It’s not Beatrice that he’s defending, but someone that she loves, because he believes her account of Hero’s conduct.
The star of this particular production is Grantham Coleman as Benedick, pulling off that character’s swagger and seeming foolishness in the first act and integrity and innate heroism when it counts in the second. Danielle Brooks is his match as Beatrice, but she’s better in the quiet/emotional moments than in the comedy, which she handles maybe a little too broadly. Even her rejection of Don Pedro’s proposal is played more for laughs than poignancy, as it was in the Kenneth Branaugh film (which almost made me ship them a little).
But her “I would eat his heart in the marketplace!” gets a well-deserved cheer from the audience, and she nails her distress in the wake of Hero’s shame. Also, she gets to show off her amazing singing voice as the play opens.
Jeremie Harris gets the tough job of Claudio, who we’re supposed to like even though he humiliates his bride-to-be at the altar (and the horror of the interrupted wedding is played to the extreme here) while Margaret Odette gets the equally difficult role of Hero, who must eventually decide to take him back. At least she gets to slap him in the face before the reconciliation, and Odette infuses her character with self-possession and a wry disposition (a far cry from the naivety that most Heros embody).
Less notably, the show’s take on Don Jon depicts him as an awkward outsider who is rather slight of stature, and who gets an inadvertently funny scene when he gives his villainous monologue right outside the house, where anyone could overhear him. And I usually take advantage of Dogberry’s scenes to grab a drink or something, but the actor powers through and delivers some genuine comedy here.
As ever, Shakespeare’s wordplay is like a bubble bath, from Beatrice’s “he that is more than a youth is not for me; and he that is less than a man, I am not for him,” to Benedick’s confident declaration that “there’s a double meaning in that,” even though Beatrice’s scornful invitation is possibly the one time in the play that there isn’t a double meaning to something. They even manage to throw in a few gags of their own, like Beatrice calling her rival “BeneDICK” and hiding in the stands (and climbing over the audience!) when Hero and Ursula start loudly discussing how much he loves her.
There are some original dance sequences that set up Margaret’s flirtation with Borachio, and they hint at the method of the ruse by having Margaret take Hero’s distinctive scarf when the latter sneaks out on the night before her wedding to do some last-minute shopping. I also appreciated a hug between Hero and her father at the end when he silently apologizes for doubting her, though I was surprised by the play's conclusion: not a celebration of love, but a call to arms as the soldiers are once more summoned away to battle. It's a surprisingly sobering end.
Watching the same play so often means that I notice something new each time, and in a new context – this time was the fact that Claudio’s hissy fit when he’s led to believe that Don Pedro has proposed to Hero behind his back (due to minimal manipulative effort on Don John’s part) is actually foreshadowing for his greater betrayal when Don John goes for round two and convinces him of Hero’s unfaithfulness. How easily he was fooled is clearly a red flag.
It’s also interesting how often Beatrice is equated with happiness, being told “you have a merry heart” and that she “was born in a merry hour.” Then there’s: “pardon me: I was born to speak all mirth and no matter,” and “to be merry best becomes you” and “there live we as merry as the day is long.” Truly, this is a very joyful play thanks to Beatrice.
All things considered, I love this interpretation of my favourite Shakespeare comedy: the set design, the venue, the cast, the chemistry... I’d definitely recommend following the link and watching this one.
Much Ado About Nothing (Wyndham’s Theatre)
I watched the Delacourte Theatre take on this play at the beginning of the month, and this version at its end, just to get some distance between the two, but it was still fascinating to see the differences between the two of them, as well as their unique interpretations on the Bard’s material.
Although this one also takes place in the modern day, it veers a little closer to the play’s original setting: not Messina, Italy, but what felt to me like a resort on the Greek islands (that said, I don’t think they ever specify this explicitly, it’s just the impression I got. There’s every chance I’m erroneously associating the set design with Mama Mia).
It’s time for another round of Benedick and Beatrice’s “merry war,” and this time they’re played by David Tennant and Catherine Tate. On the one hand, this means the back-and-forth between them is exceptionally funny; on the other, it’s hard for me to extricate them from the completely platonic rapport of their characters on Doctor Who. The chemistry is there, but it’s not quite as romantic as it should be, especially since their big declarations of love are played for broad comedy, with a lot of hooting and shrieking.
And yet the two of them make their mark on each character: Beatrice is more brash this time around, while Benedick is more foolish. There’s always something of the court jester about him, and in this version, his grand entrance has him driving onto the stage in a golf cart – but that makes the contrast all the more striking when he steps up in defence of Hero, not only being one of only two men in the wedding party to come to her defence (the other being the friar) but the only person trying to deescalate the situation instead of worsening it.
He’s a man who doesn’t realize his own worth, and there’s an especially poignant moment here when the line: “Love me! Why, it must be requited,” is subtly rearranged to become: “Love me? [looks down at himself] Why? It must be requited!”
And this time around it’s obvious that Benedick and Beatrice enjoy their joshing with each other, and are clearly looking forward to seeing each other at the beginning of the play. Throughout, there’s very much a “have I mentioned how much I hate him/her today?” vibe at work, and the two seem incapable of not complaining about each other every chance they get. Benedick will say: “talk not of her” and then launch into another rant about her.
As said above, Claudio is a hard nut to crack, as humiliating a girl on her wedding day is pretty unforgivable, so Tom Bateman tries to make him something of a drama queen, to which everything is either the greatest thing ever or the worst outcome to occur in the history of mankind. The advantage of this is that he’s depicted as truly mourning the loss of Hero after her family fake her death, to the point where he almost kills himself the night she’s laid to rest (yeah, they probably should have had someone keep an eye on this guy, just in case).
On the other hand, this Hero is a little bland. She’s certainly less demure and naïve than most productions make her, and she keeps her composure when Claudio turns on her at the altar. But Margaret Odette (above) was definitely my preferred Hero of the two, who retained the character’s innate vulnerability, but somehow fills her full of spunk and strength as well.
Yet as ever, the fact that the story has been updated to modern times weakens some of the key plot-points. No self-respecting woman would ever take Claudio back, and I found myself wincing when the friar tells Hero: “this wedding day perhaps is but prolonged.” Why on earth would she would want to marry him after that, or indeed, why would he would want to marry her, since she’ll have enough emotional leverage over him to last a lifetime? He’ll never win any disagreements when she has the power to remind him of what went down on their wedding day.
Not helping in this particular case is that the setting is quite hedonistic. These are people who have come to party, and there’s barely a scene in which someone isn’t smoking or drinking. We even get a raunchy stag and hens’ night for Claudio and Hero, complete with the presence of strippers for both of them. It kind of undermines the whole preoccupation with Hero’s honour and virtue, as she’s already living it up the night before her nuptials.
The Delacourte Theatre version had a better idea, in which she sneaks out alone to buy some lingerie for the honeymoon, though both made use of a distinctive piece of clothing to pull off the ruse that Hero is cheating on Claudio – in the former it was a scarf, in the latter it’s Hero’s fake veil, which is pulled off her head by Borachio and placed on Margaret’s, conveniently concealing her face when Claudio and Don Pedro spot them together.
Um, what else? As ever, the Dogberry stuff is a bit tedious, and as in the Delacourte version, Don Jon is characterized as a slippery little weasel as opposed to any kind of physical threat. There’s a potentially interesting gender flip when Leonato’s brother Antonio becomes his wife Imogen, but the underwritten nature of the character means she doesn’t make much of an impact (I mean, you’d think the mother of the humiliated bride would have more to say about what is done to her daughter, but the original play doesn’t allow for it).
But this adaptation deserves full-credit for a Don Pedro who is a fully realized character instead of merely a plot-mover. He’s played by Adam James, and though you won’t recognize the name, you would the face, as he’s one of those prolific character actors that’s done the rounds. When he makes his proposal to Beatrice, he puts on a faux-hearty demeanour even though he’s being 100% sincere, and when she responds with laughter, it’s mortifying for both of them – a far cry from the gentle letdown that Emma Thompson gives Denzel Washington in the Kenneth Branaugh film.
He's also given the melancholic disposition of Antonio in The Merchant of Venice, and is pointedly the only character who doesn’t join in the festivities of the final scene, but rather watches from the sidelines.
The production makes the most of its revolving stage, and although some of the physical comedy didn’t work for me there’s some very nimble choreography at work. On that note, if I was to point out the biggest difference between these two performances (not counting the cosmetic stuff regarding the sets and costumes and so on) it would be the shift in humour. The Delacourte plays things broadly; Wyndham's goes for cringe-comedy. So many of the laughs derive from the characters trying not to look the fool, and failing miserably. A lot of the laughter of the audience was accompanied by groans, and the famous scene in which Benedick and Beatrice overhear their friends talk about how much in love the other is ends with the former covered in paint, and the latter dangling from a cable wire, flailing for balance.
Given the cast involved, I suspect most people would prefer to watch this version of the play than that of the Delacourte Theatre, though I have to say the latter just edged out the former by a fraction in my estimation. Still, each one is very good – which is why I watched them both!
Antony and Cleopatra (National Theatre)
Again, I have to tank Tumblr for drawing me towards this production, as it was a gif-set of Sophie Okenedo that informed me of its existence, but as it happens, I have far less to say about it given my unfamiliarity with the play itself. In fact, this is the first time I’ve ever seen Antony and Cleopatra performed in its entirety.
Starring Sophie Okenedo as Cleopatra, the Queen of Egypt and Drama in equal measure, and Ralph Fiennes as Antony, who just wants to find a quiet place to lie down and rest, this is yet another take on Shakespeare that updates itself into a contemporary setting. These characters lounge by the swimming pool, watch current events unfolding on television screens, carry automatic weapons while wearing army fatigues, and utilize submarines in place of warships.
The play asks us, is it better to live with passion or die with duty? Or visa versa, as there’s a lot of both going around. Given the play was written in 1606 and that history clearly lays out the winners and losers of this particular conflict, it’s naturally austere duty that wins the day, though love is inevitably immortalized in death – so who really emerges victorious?
Colour-coding distinguishes the difference between Egypt and Rome, with the former rendered in shades of yellow and gold, in which characters lazily paddle in a sunken pool and engage in all sorts of idleness and debauchery, where shirts are always unbuttoned and drinks always at hand, with the sense that a party is forever transpiring just off-stage, while the latter is cool blues and whites, all marble and stone, in which everyone is uniformed and straight-backed. The only similarity is that wealth permeates every detail: this is a conflict of decadent equals.
Okenedo’s Cleopatra is naturally the centrepiece of the production, and she’s mercurial and sexual, affectionate and deliberately over-the-top – most of the time Fiennes’s Antony feels like he’s struggling to keep up with her (that’s not a slight on Fiennes, it feels like a deliberate acting choice, the more so given the emphasis on his age). I was surprised to see Tunji Kasim as Caesar, as he’s now better known for his roles in Nancy Drew and Bridgerton, but his take on the character inevitably cannot compare to the two lovers, and he doesn’t come across as a contrast to their passion so much as an understated backdrop to it.
As the only other female character of note, Hannah Morrish makes for a much more deliberate contrast to Cleopatra, who is staid and reserved instead of sensual and spoiled, though her nervous hand gestures, in which she continually lifts her hands and then changes her mind in a split-second, got on my nerves. (Though I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt and assume it was deliberate, again in contrast to Cleopatra’s languor).
At a whopping three hours long, there’s a lot to absorb, from the complexity of the love affairs to the war delegations to the extremely prolonged death scenes. The biggest surprise is that a live snake is used for the famous poisoning scene, and that they play for comedy in odd places (“how heavy weighs my lord” gets the biggest laugh from the audience) and once again a revolving stage is utilized in order to change quickly from a swimming pool to a war room to the exterior of a submarine.
The thing is, I have seen no other version of the play to compare this to, and a part of me wishes I could have seen it staged in its original time and place (that is, Egypt and Rome in 30 BC). But this made for a pretty worthy introduction to a play I had no prior familiarity with – now it’s a matter of finding the time to read the original text.
The Dark Crystal: Creation Myths Volumes I, II and III by Brian Froud and others
I’ve had these graphic novels forever, and never found the right time or place to crack them open... until now. Conceived by Brian Froud (the original film’s conceptual designer) but unfortunately not illustrated by him (barring the cover art) this three-part series is essentially what The Silmarillion is to The Lord of the Rings: the mythological prequel that explains some of the core concepts of The Dark Crystal movie.
This includes the origins of Thra and its inhabitants, the arrival of the Urskek from across the stars, the events behind the darkening of the crystal, and the long search for the crystal shard (which will eventually end up in the hands of Jen, the protagonist of the film). There are plenty of familiar characters, most notably Aughra, the horned and wizened crone who is essentially the “Mother Earth” of this world, but also many new ones, such as a plethora of Gelflings and the new character of Raunip, Aughra’s son, who is possibly the most important player in this unfolding drama.
I’m not entirely sure how involved Froud was in this trilogy; his foreword suggests that he came up with some of the basic plot-points and new characters, but unfortunately his artwork only graces the covers. The internal illustrations were done by a range of people: Brian Holguin, Alex Sheikman, Lizzy John, Joshua Dysart and Matthew Dow Smith, and I can’t say I was hugely in love with the finished results: the lines are a bit too thick, the shapes very blocky and bulbous, and they have none of the detail or quirkiness of Froud’s original artwork.
I’m sure Froud is a very busy man, and comic book art isn’t his forté, but... well, it’s hard not to wish that his work filled this entire collection.
Luckily, the story itself is fairly compelling. I was reminded of Tolkien’s famous quote on world-building: “Part of the attraction of The Lord of the Rings is, I think, due to the glimpses of a large history in the background: an attraction like that of viewing far off an unvisited island, or seeing the towers of a distant city gleaming in a sunlit mist. To go there is to destroy the magic, unless new unattainable vistas are again revealed,” and in this sense I was a little leery about delving too deeply into the genesis of Thra. To know exactly what went on in another world, in another time, is to lose some of the inherent mystery of it all.
But that doesn’t mean I didn’t want to sate my curiosity, and the volumes themselves operate almost like anthologies. Through there is an overarching narrative of Raunip trying to uncover the secrets of the Urskek, there are also short stories, ancient prophecies, a myriad of songs and verse, and seemingly unrelated tales – though some are woven back into the larger storyline – that make up each book’s page count.
And it was fun to speculate on the potential inspirations that lent themselves to the story of Thra: the world is brought to life through song, much like Narnia and Middle-Earth, and Raunip’s physical form reminded me a lot of Grendel, just as the loss of Aughra’s eye in exchange for knowledge is very much in keeping with Odin’s similar sacrifice. There are foundling children, and seafaring odysseys, and many examples of hubris and personal ambition that exceeds a character’s reach.
There is repetition of various themes, like “creation now turns to destruction” and “everything becomes something new in the end” – basically, all the most potent tropes from our various myths and legends.
But in keeping with Tolkien’s wisdom on the subject, not everything is explained. The origins of the Urkek remain a tantalizing mystery, as does the identity of Raunip’s father – if indeed he ever had one. The nature of his birth is kept a secret for most of the trilogy, but even the reveal only poses more questions. Aughra’s birth out of the earth of Thra is depicted, yet we get nothing on the beginning of the Gelflings, which are here depicted as much more primitive than their latter-day counterparts (it’s a nice detail). Despite her goddess-like nature, Aughra doesn’t create them, but simply happens upon them one day, they having already established their own culture and traditions – including the mastery of “dreamfasting.”
We get some insight into the communities of the podlings, the construction of Aughra’s observatory, the formation of the Castle of the Crystal, and a race of mining creatures that were originally meant to feature in the film, but were cut due to time limitations.
But naturally, the centrepiece of the story is the arrival of the Urksek and their eventual sundering into two species, the Skeksis and the urRu. These two world-shaking events take place a thousand years apart, at the Great Conjunction of the Three Suns, and of course, provide the backdrop for The Dark Crystal, which takes place yet another thousand years hence. Where do they come from? What do they want? We never get a precise answer, and Raunip is deeply suspicious of their presence and designs on Thra, which inevitably leads to tragic consequences. It’s a very rich, satisfying journey through the history of this particular world and its inhabitants.
There are also some extra features at the back of each book: pages from Brian Froud’s sketchbook, some behind-the-scenes photos of the 1982 filming process, and the free comic book that was released in 2011, which was designed as a sort of “trailer” for this then-upcoming Creation Myths trilogy (though for some reason, Raunip is depicted as much, much smaller in this preview).
So there’s not a lot to complain about. Granted, I winced at the use of the terms “oldling” and “youngling,” and the placement of the three moons in the sky of Thra seems completely arbitrary from page-to-page, but as an anthology of this world’s mythological beginnings, I enjoyed it immensely (though would have truly loved it with some better artwork). There are introductions to legendary figures like Gyr and Jarra-Jen, poems and short stories, fragments of other tales and different versions of events regarding things like how female Gelfings got their wings – all of it weaving together beautifully.
In a recent chat with a co-worker, he told me he enjoyed the most recent Planet of the Apes film mostly due to its world-building, and that he would have been happy just watching the apes of one particular village capture and train hunting birds – and that’s how I feel about The Dark Crystal franchise. The story is less interesting to me than the world-building and all the imaginative flora and fauna that went into creating this imaginary landscape. This trilogy strikes a good balance in telling us some of the story behind the film, while retaining a sense of mystery and intrigue with what is left unsaid.
Jim Henson’s The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance by Jeffrey Addiss, Will Matthews and others
These comics were published some years after Creation Myths, and were designed to be official prequels to the Netflix show, which was itself a prequel to the original film. As such, these stories are preoccupied with introducing various elements of Thra that become relevant in the show, whether it’s important artefacts or the backstories of the protagonists (usually the courtships of their parents).
There are three altogether: The Quest for the Dual Glaive, which sees Gelfings Ordon and Fara teaming up to search for the titular glaive in order to defend Stone-in-the-Wood from arathim attacks, The Ballad of Hup and Barfinnious, in which the two main characters (a podling and a Gelfling, respectively) go adventuring together, only to discover the first signs of the Darkening, and The Journey Into the Mondo Leviadin, in which young Maudra Mayrin attempts to quell the threat of a Gelfling secession, only to be swallowed (along with one of her opponents) by a great leviathan.
All of the stories in some way link back to the Netflix series: Fara is the Maudra of Stone-in-the-Wood by the time that story begins, Hup becomes the podling companion of Deet, and the likes of Ordon and Mayrin are the parents of protagonists Rian and Brea. There’s also some context given to concepts like the Darkening, and artefacts like the Dual Glaive, which of course play a big part in Age of Resistance.
There’s also plenty of exploration into the culture and world of Thra, from how the Gelflings form their communities and the importance of the wildlife that surrounds them, to their relationship with the Skeksis overlords, who don’t play a huge part in any of these stories, but are present in all of them – a constant reminder that the Gelflings live in the shadow of their own destruction. That the Gelflings initially lived in relative (albeit deceitful) harmony with the Skeksis was treated as something of a reveal in Netflix’s Age of Resistance, so it was a wise decision to keep them on the periphery of these tales.
The stories contain reflections on the nature of a hero, reveal the somewhat inferior social status that podlings are forced to labour under, and occasionally get quite violent, with a fair amount of splattered blood and severed limbs. The Gelflings are divided into the seven clans, as laid out in the Netflix series and the tie-in YA novels, each one with its own culture and aesthetic, all of which are matriarchies ruled by a “maudra.” You get to visit the usual fantasy environs: mountain villages, underground grottoes, sea-faring vessels, mysterious forests – all with a distinctive Thra bent to distinguish everything from what we’ve seen so many times before. There’s also a cool rendering of the Stone-in-the-Wood carvings at the back of the first book, which Jen and Kira will stumble across many thousands of years later...
I even spotted a shout out to Avatar: The Last Airbender, what with a merchant crying: “avenge my cabbages!”
The most prevalent theme is that of duality, which wends its way into almost every panel. There are obvious nods, such as the dual glaive, but it’s also noteworthy that every single story requires teamwork between two very difficult individuals to achieve their stated goals: Ordon and Fara, Hup and Barfinnious, and Mayrin and Kam’Lu. In each case, they have to get over their differences while also relying on their own unique strengths and skill-sets.
In this, it’s obviously a reflection of the duality of the Skeksis and Mystics, which is the crux of this saga – this whole world – in its entirety. The truth of that relationship won’t be revealed to its fullest extent until the climax of the movie, which technically takes place thousands of years after the events shown in these graphic novels – but the motif is there, baked into the pages.
The artwork is a bit of a letdown; it’s not that it’s bad, but I always equate The Dark Crystal with incredible detail and intricacy, which these images simply do not have. Oh, to have employed the talents of Jo Rioux or Phil Jimenez or Sana Takeda for these books, who would have filled every panel with eye candy. As it is, I had the exact opposite problem here as I did in Creation Myths: if that trilogy’s artwork was too blocky and bulky, then the figures here are too spiky and stylized.
Ah well. Any supplementary work to The Dark Crystal is something I’m interested in seeking out, and it fascinates me how it’s all grown around the 1982 film like a coastal shelf. Because Jim Henson’s vision of a world was so fascinating, there’s really no end to the potential that other artists and storytellers have in delving deeper into its lore.
Jessi and the Dance School Phantom by Anne M. Martin
This is the fifth Jessi book, her first mystery-based story, and the last mystery in the main series before the Babysitters Club Mystery branch of books began. (Which I’m really looking forward to re-reading, by the way. Once that existed, I think my ten-year-old self exclusively purchased the titles in that spin-off series).
Despite only being eleven, ballet prodigy Jessi lands the lead role in her class’s production of Sleeping Beauty. She’s thrilled, but also a little trepidatious, knowing that it was a coveted role among the rest of her peers.
Sure enough, once rehearsals start the strange occurrences begin: Jessi’s toe shoes go missing, she slips on a wet spot and hurts her ankle, her leotard is stolen and then returned with slashes in it, and she begins to receive threatening notes. Unsurprisingly, she doesn’t tell her parents or dance teacher about this sabotage, but only the girls in the Babysitters Club, who decide to investigate. This involves sneaking into the back row of the auditorium while Jessi is rehearsing and scoping out the rest of the class.
Yeah, the entirety of their investigation is just reporting which of Jessi’s classmates are giving her the stink-eye during rehearsals. It comes down to three suspects: Carrie, who is aging out of the class and needs a good role for her resume, Katie Beth, who was the girl giving Jessi a hard time in Jessi’s Secret Language, and Hilary, who has one of those awful stage mums who puts her under constant pressure to succeed.
SPOILERS
Jessie tries to keep an eye on them as the threats escalate, and gradually they’re eliminated: Carrie because she’s absent on one of the days the phantom leaves a note, and Katie Beth because she saves Jessi from a piece of falling scenery. That leaves Hilary.
In coming up with a plan to trap her into exposing herself, the babysitters tell Jessi to play on Hilary’s need to be the teacher’s pet and trick her into writing a sign for the dance instructor. Sounds good, except that none of them take into consideration what Jessi should ask Hilary to write until she’s put the plan into effect. Way to think ahead, guys.
After some stalling, Jessi tells her that Madame Noelle wants a warning sign about some spillage on the stairs, and Hilary (being dumb enough to fall for this) uses the red-ink pen and familiar handwriting that she used to write the notes.
Caught red-handed, Hilary’s excuse is that her mother was putting too much pressure on her to land the lead role, and she figured that if Jessi dropped out, she could take her place. Jessi is gracious enough to let it go, even though I’d be trying to have this bitch arrested.
From there, the production goes off without a hitch, Hilary decides to stand up to her pushy mother and quits ballet (I’m pretty sure this was one of the plots in that ballet movie Zoe Saldana was in) and all’s well that ends well.
As ever, one bit of the mystery is never solved – in this case it’s the bit of falling scenery which nearly crushes Jessi and which Hilary swears she wasn’t responsible for (Jessi believes her since a stunt like that would have been impossible to pull off without being seen, and she chalks it down to the clumsy stagehands) but also a strange moment in which Carrie gives Jessi the wrong instructions on what manoeuvre to perform. It culminates in Jessi leaping onto an unnoticed spill of water and hurting her ankle, after which Mme Noelle tells her she was meant to be doing something completely different.
Was Hilary responsible for the spill? Did Carrie give her the wrong instructions on purpose? We never find out and it bugs me.
The ghostwriter behind this book at least had an understanding of the Sleeping Beauty ballet, what with mentions of the Bluebird of Happiness and the Rose Adagio, and I also liked the fact the title is clearly a nod to The Phantom of the Opera, even though the solution to the mystery isn’t anywhere near as interesting as a deformed psycho hiding in the sewers. In fact, it’s a little strange the girls never entertain the possibility that the threat is coming from a supernatural force – usually it’s their first explanation for anything weird.
Oh, and then there’s the babysitter B-plot. It involves Kristy coming up with the idea to have a pet show for the neighbourhood kids, which ends up being a complete nightmare for everyone involved. The kids without pets feel left out, the kids with pets get overly competitive, siblings argue over who gets to enter what pet, kids with unimpressive pets are convinced they won’t win against the cooler ones, and none of the babysitters have any idea how to judge this thing. How do you rank a dog against a hamster, or a cat against a goldfish?
Furthermore, it has absolutely nothing to do with what’s going on in the A-plot, which is a first for this series. Usually one will inform the other, either thematically or in providing a solution for whatever’s going on in the more important story, but here it’s just a completely random series of events to pad out the chapters.
And of course, the solution is obvious: not only do the pet-heavy houses loan out their excess animal friends to the pet-less kids in the neighbourhood, but everyone gets their own uniquely customized prize, such as “funniest” or “smartest” or “best all-round pet” and so on.
Not one of Kristy’s best ideas, and not really in-character either since her very first job for the club was looking after Pinky and Buffy the St. Bernards and vowing never to deal with animals again.
Also, some kids called Scott and Timothy Hsu turn up… have we met them before? Because I think they were in the Little Sister books, the events of which are often alluded to in the main series, such as the fact many of the kids in Karen’s class are (pretend) married to other ones.
Stacey’s Emergency by Anne M. Martin
It’s a relief to get to this book, as it feels like this series has been foreshadowing Stacey’s health problems for at least twenty instalments. Honestly, the writers usually seed details about future stories a couple of books in advance, but characters have been noting how tired and washed-out Stacey looks since #30 at least.
Now, finally, it all comes to a head. She’s always thirsty, she’s always exhausted, she’s falling behind on her schoolwork, she’s sick of being in the middle of her parents’ arguments (each one seems convinced the other is dating someone inappropriate and keeps needling Stacey for details) and she’s in that fey state of mind that makes her deliberately eat things she shouldn’t, like snacks from Claudia’s junk food stash or some fudge that Charlotte and Becca make while she’s babysitting.
And I get it: that urge to deliberately tempt fate because you’re weary of dealing with a situation that’s dragging on and on and you just want SOMETHING to happen to end the interminable waiting for the inevitable disaster to strike. As Stacey says at one point: “I was sick and tired of being sick and tired.”
When a weekend with her father in New York comes up, she spends the train ride trying to catch up on her homework, falling asleep, and drinking with her hands out of a tiny sink in the bathroom. (There’s a slightly funny moment in which she recalls a foldable, portable plastic cup that she used to mock her mother for carrying around, only to desperately want it – we’ve all been there as well, when your parents’ dorkiness ends up being extremely useful).
She gets to her father’s apartment, gets up all night to drink water, and is taken to hospital the next morning when it becomes obvious that things aren’t normal.
From there, it’s a just a book about how boring it is to be a teenage girl in hospital while doctors try to figure out what’s wrong with you. We get details on the excessive waste of hospital food wrapping (“everything that can be is individually wrapped – a slice of bread in a disposable wrapper, juice in a disposable plastic cup with a foil lid… I would look at my plate after a meal, and it would practically be hidden by a pile of plastic and foil and paper”) and Stacey’s parents trying to avoid each other during visiting hours, since they start fighting whenever they’re in the same room together.
Hilariously, Mrs McGill calls Claudia to tell her that Stacey is in hospital – hilarious not because she called her, but because Claudia is babysitting at the time and there’s no explanation given as to how Mrs McGill would know this, what house she’d be at, or why she didn’t just call Claudia’s home number and leave a message with her parents. I was also somewhat amused that Claudia’s first thought on hearing Stacey was in hospital wasn’t due to her diabetes, but that she’d been attacked on the streets of New York.
Laine Cummings manages to sneak into the hospital by herself by pretending she’s part of another crowd of visitors, and the four older babysitters take the train for a day visit (and have to keep hiding in the bathroom since patients are only allowed two guests at a time). We’re also informed that – inexplicably – Cokie has gotten a nose job. “What does she look like?” “Like she got a nose job. You can always tell.” On a thirteen-year-old? Really?
Eventually Stacey’s parents end up at her bedside at the same time and immediately start bickering, to which Stacey tells them to shut up and get out. Gasp! I guess this was scandalous back in the nineties; these days the kids would be swearing up a storm and throwing anything to hand. It’s actually rather sad though, in which Stacey realizes: “I had the power to move two adults to tears, but not to make them act civilly toward one another.”
Eventually she summons up the words to communicate properly, informing the two of them that she doesn’t want to be in the middle of their acrimonious divorce, that the doctors are the experts when it comes to her health, and she can’t look after their feelings while she’s grappling with her diabetes. It’s nicely done, and there are plenty of solid insights into the tedium of feeling sick, but ultimately, it’s just a story about Stacey having to stay in hospital for a while. We don’t even really get any clear idea of why her diabetes were playing up or what the doctors plan to do about it.
The B-plot is Charlotte Johanssen fretting about Stacey’s health issues and temporarily becoming a hypochondriac – something her mother puts down to her subconsciously wanting to join Stacey in hospital to make sure she’s okay. It’s not very interesting.
There’s a cute moment when Charlotte calls Becca and just says: “it’s me,” to which Stacey observes “only really good friends can do that,” and another when Stacey returns home to a welcome back party in Stoneybrook, where she hugs everyone “except the Pike triplets, who said they would die if a girl touched them.”
Oh, and at least one mild Mary Anne Is The Worst moment, in which she suggests serving lemonade at Stacey’s welcome home party, and it’s CHARLOTTE, a CHILD, who reminds her that it’ll have to be sugar-free.
The Ship of Spectres by Patricia Elliot
This is the second, and as far as I know, the last book to feature girl detective Connie Carew (though it does seem to end on setup for a third mystery set in New York which has obviously never materialized). The previous book was more of a Gothic novel for young readers than a mystery, though this one uses the more familiar beats of a “locked room whodunnit,” to tell its story, only with a ship instead of a locked room.
Picking up at the conclusion of House of Eyes, newly engaged Arthur and Ida are onboard the HMS Princess May on a voyage to New York, with Connie as their questionably young chaperone. As you’d expect from any Death on the Nile-esque mystery, there are an eclectic group of passengers onboard: business magnates and journalists, ballet dancers and aristocrats. Throw in rumours of a ghost onboard, and you’ve got a solid mystery that’s definitely better than its predecessor.
It’s also one of two books I read this month that features a mystery on a passenger ship in the early 19th century, as solved by a girl detective. As I pointed out in last month’s log, this description is to denote youth, not gender, and I’ve always found this sub-category of detective fiction appealing. What is it about a plucky young woman solving mysteries in period settings that’s so much fun to read? Maybe because she also has to overcome the social conventions of her time? Maybe because those same conventions make her so underestimated by others?
Connie Carew isn’t on the same level as the likes of Enola Holmes or Aggie Morton or Lady Grace, but they’re nice little books – it’s a shame they didn’t continue.
The Secret Detectives by Ella Risbridger
It wasn’t that the Connie Carew books were bad, but you can definitely see the difference in quality when you follow-up with something like this. Some books are pure plot, others provide insight into life and human nature, giving you something to think about besides the mystery at hand.
This one has a bit of an unusual premise: what if Mary Lennox from The Secret Garden solved a mystery onboard the ship that took her from India to England at the start of the book? But what if she was not, in fact, Mary Lennox, but a girl called Isobel, even if she’s given the exact same personality and backstory, right down to her parents dying of cholera and having only a brown snake for company in the empty bungalow?
It's a little odd. On the one hand, why not just make her Mary Lennox? The answer would seem to be that Mary didn’t complete any character development by this point in the book by Frances Hodgson Burnett, and so couldn’t be warmed up by making friends on the trip to England. But if she’s meant to be a completely different character, then why skew so close to Mary’s history?
This story also has to grapple with the fact that Mary (or Isobel) is a profoundly unlikeable person at the beginning of The Secret Garden, though for a few chapters (before I realized what this was based on) I honestly thought she was on the spectrum. As per the original book, she’s sullen and unfriendly, but she also hates reading, which was odd to me for two reasons. Firstly, I don’t recall Mary Lennox disliking reading, and secondly, there’s no better way to alienate your reader, who probably DOES like reading (and which is presumably the reason why they’re reading your book) than a character who doesn’t.
A character can be as unlikeable as you want, can have nay number of flaws or idiosyncrasies, but I feel that “hates reading” is the singular bridge too far when it comes to relatability.
Also, the title puzzles me. Are they meant to be detectives that investigate secrets, or detectives that are themselves a secret? Unclear.
In any case, Isobel Petty (the Mary stand-in) is newly orphaned and being transported on board the S.S. Marianna to her new home in England, chaperoned by Mrs Colonel Hartington-Davis, who has two children of her own: Letty and Horace. Isobel hates all three of them, and fed up with their company, decides one night that she wants to enjoy being on the deck by herself.
It’s there she notices two figures on the telescope platform, having what looks like a heated argument that culminates in one throwing the other overboard. Struck with horror, she’s pulled into a lifeboat by a boy her own age called Sam Khan, who also witnessed the murder. Deciding that she’ll be the Watson to his Holmes, Sam proposes that the two of them team up to discover who is missing and who the killer might be. Naturally, it’s easier said than done.
The book’s best aspect is its prose, which is filled with rich and thought-provoking observations. For example:
Nobody on board the S.S. Marianna seemed to notice that they were talking and eating and laughing and drinking in a world where somebody had died.
[Isobel] felt suddenly rather dejected, because Sam felt dejected, and the little room was full of glumness and despair. She did not like this; this was why it was better mostly to be by yourself. She didn’t like people – she knew that – and how strange to feel sad because someone else felt sad.
The murderer started to laugh and it was quite a nice laugh, really. It was only not a nice laugh because it was the kind of laugh that had killed someone... and might threaten to do anything else at any time.
The book is filled with reflections like this, which elevates it from a fairly standard girl detective story (the resolution of which isn’t all that impressive) into more of an exploration of the thought-processes of a social misfit who is trying to make sense of the world around her. As with The Ship of Spectres, there seems to be no follow-up to this particular book, but it’s up there with Murder Most Unladylike and The Sinclair’s Mysteries in terms of quality.
The Winter of the Witch by Katherine Arden
The third and final book in Katherine Arden’s Winternight trilogy was – all things considered – a really good read. As I explained in my review of the first two books, I felt very “locked in” while reading them, and that’s coming from a perpetual daydreamer who often drifts off mid-page, not necessarily because the story isn’t interesting, but because that’s just how my brain is wired. It takes a lot to have my total attention, but in the case of Winternight, I’d often need a couple of seconds to reorientate myself whenever I put the book down.
In hindsight, I can also commend Arden for not falling into middle book syndrome, in which the second instalment neither starts nor finishes anything. Many of the overarching mysteries and plots are resolved in The Girl in the Tower, which allows for a relatively clean slate with which to begin The Winter of the Witch.
It picks up right where the last book left off, almost too quickly for the reader to take a breath, in the immediate aftermath of Kasyan’s defeat and the attempted coup of the city of Muscovy. Vasilisa Petrovna’s disguise was found out, and now she faces accusations of witchcraft, led by the zealous priest Konstantin. As her brother Sasha and Prince Dmitrii try to save her from the pyre, she’s whisked away by more supernatural forces, into the Road Through Midnight, where the final pieces of her heritage are to be found.
I've always love the concept of “in-between worlds,” and I only wish Vasya could have spent more time in this one (it reminded me of Utterly Dark and the Heart of the Wild). Instead, the book’s structure can neatly be divided into two: the first half deal with the return of the terrible Bear (a powerful, chaotic spirit-god) and the priest Konstantin, while the second involves Vasya mustering forces to help defend Rus from the Tartars, culminating in the battle of Kulikovo in 1380 (a real historical event).
I can understand why it’s structured the way it is, especially regarding the role that the Bear has to play, but it reminds me a bit of that Harry Potter tweet that was designed to mock the skewed priorities of the Game of Thrones finale: “now that we’ve defeated Voldemort, we have to concentrate on overthrowing Cornelius Fudge.” The Bear and Konstantin were the trilogy’s most compelling villains – once they’re dealt with, the threat of the Tartars inevitably feels like a letdown.
Baba Yaga makes her inevitable but long-awaited appearance, as well as a very funny mushroom spirit, and of course, Vasya’s relationship with the frost demon/god of winter Morozko is finally consummated. Regarding this love story, I never got the sense that Arden was particularly interested in it herself, and even the way in which Vasya seduces the god is mercenary – she needs the amnesic Morozko to remember her, and so uses sex as a way to remind him of their history. It almost feels obligatory, like Arden knows the reader was expecting it, and so makes it happen in a deeply unromantic way.
I would have liked to have seen Vasya returning to her sister’s house to collect her niece Marya, as she plans to throughout the book, as well as enjoying a reunion with her other siblings, her aunt and her grandmother, but sadly things end before we see her reinstated in the house with chicken legs, learning her craft and tending to the magical horses. Arden was very good with building relationships between women and family members, so it’s a shame that they’re given such short-shrift in the end, though that’s my only real complaint.
This has been a deeply rewarding trilogy, and as I reach the end of my Slavic fantasy reading list, I’m glad to find it’s going out on a high note.
This is Not a Book about Benedict Cumberbatch by Tabitha Carvan
The nature of fandom is something I’m always grappling with: this online world of strangers discussing things that aren’t actually real and how it can all get a bit out of hand sometimes. The fact that I was a little embarrassed to put the title of this book on the Tumblr post that directs people to this blog was telling, because that reaction is the very point of this book: that women find their passions and pastimes to be shameful.
Such a thing happened to Tabitha Carvan after she began to emerge from the mental fugue of raising two very young children to discover she was besotted with Benedict Cumberbatch – watching Sherlock on repeat, tracking down his entire body of work, buying merchandise with his image on it, and eventually making online friends with other women going through a similar experience. This book is a semi-autobiographical account exploring her obsession and what it meant to her, but more importantly, her research into “the joy of loving something – anything – like your life depends on it,” specifically in regards to women.
I decided to read partly because I want to understand more about the general workings of fandom and what draws people to it: our relationships with stories, the psychological implications of it, and what makes people do such bizarre things in the name of it. Remember the Voltron fan who tried to blackmail the writers into making her ship canon? Or the Michael Rosenbaum fans who presented him with a box of sex toys at a fundraising event? Or the legions of online conspiracy theorists who are convinced the wife of any popular male celebrity has him trapped in a loveless marriage and is faking her pregnancies? At its core is a fixation on narratives, and I was hoping this book would shed some light on the subject.
It does and it doesn’t, because ultimately it’s more of a feminist treatise about how women are ridiculed into “putting away childish things,” while they’re still very young, instead of being encouraged to pursue their silly, meaningless passions. Boys on the other hand? Are allowed to have their specially allotted playtimes well into adulthood, whether it’s football, nerd stuff, or that New Zealander who has devoted every second of his free time into hunting the giant squid, family and career be damned!
Which makes for a fascinating read... just not precisely what I thought I’d be getting from it. Which is fine! Carvan still makes a compelling argument for the right for grown women to pursue their joy, and why the rest of the world is intent on making this fact their problem.
And yet in a couple of ways, I feel a little at odds with this book. First of all, I’ve never felt particularly ashamed of my fandom interests, perhaps because I’m surrounded by like-minded people at work and home. (Seriously, any given library in Christchurch will have desks and cubbyholes and lockers covered with fandom-related stuff – no one cares!) In saying that, I’ve also never gone overboard in demonstrating my love for any fandom-related thing. I have no urge whatsoever to cosplay or get celebrity signatures or go to cons. I haven’t written fanfiction in decades, not because I’m ashamed of it, but because I just don’t feel any pressing need to fix or explore a canon work any more deeply than what it already provides me.
My identity is not my fandom. Writing on this blog is a hobby. This book would call that healthy, or perhaps... not? Because I don’t passionately love something the way the women featured therein do. I’ve never had a hyper-fixation to the extent of anything described in this book, so am I the freak?
And that already sounds like I’m trying to distance myself from this book by pulling a “not like the other girls.”
Carvan says upfront that obsessions don’t mean anything to those that don’t have them, so I’ll point out that the circus around Benedict Cumberbatch has always been lost on me. I don’t find him particularly attractive, and I DO think that paying a fortune to attend a play that you’d otherwise have no interest in seeing for the sake of a single actor is a little silly, as is the story of a woman who spends her free time painting portraits of Cumberbatch in women’s lingerie. That’s weird, right?
But then I catch myself. Is that just the internalized misogyny talking? Would I feel the same way about a guy whose desk is slathered in sporting paraphernalia? Probably not, though I can also guarantee that I wouldn’t be very interested in striking up a conversation with him. Another apt comparison is the slideshow that depicted teenage girls crying over the news that One Direction had broken up, interspersed with photos of grown men weeping because their football team had lost a match. Only one of these two groups was ridiculed on social media, and as one of the interview subjects in this book states: “You know, there are a lot of people, their lives revolve around golf. They don’t feel guilty.”
Carvan delves deeper into her subject matter by exploring issues of control, addiction, obsession, hobbies and guilt as they pertain to women, arguing that what we lose around the age of adolescence is the question of: “who am I?” which is replaced with “how do I fit in?” She discusses at length the different reaction she had as a mother to her son’s interest in trains and her daughter’s love of girly-girl things:
A boy does what he does because he has a passion, he follows his heart. It’s a worthy pursuit, with inherent, universal and lasting value, so we’d better support and protect it. When a girl does what she does, it’s merely the by-product of outside forces. She’s being manipulated into having inauthentic, disposable feelings for something with dubious appeal. Boys can enjoy play for a lifetime; girls are expected to mature out of it. It passes, just like their fads.
There is of course discussion of the “cool girl” and peer pressure and gatekeeping and how the more women like a thing, the more denigrated it’s likely to become in the public eye:
Unexpressed and unseen are how women’s feelings hold the most value. Hidden inside library books, tucked away in online forums, at a girls’ night in, dancing in the dark... that’s where they come alive. Send them into the real world and, upon contact with light, they become the squeals of the Cumberbitches.
When a group of women or girls love something, it’s like the more there are of them, the stupider and more embarrassing their feelings become. You could plot it on a graph. Despite their enormous market power, they devalue the cool factor of everything they touch.
Her argument is that an obsession with a celebrity, or a show, or a band, or anything that girls like, isn’t a distraction from real life, but an actual life source; that tapping into something that excites you isn’t compensating for the lack of it in your everyday reality, but opens up an internal world of creativity and discovery that was there the whole time.
And yet I keep coming back to and yet. This recent Tumblr post pointed out a lot of shows seem to go off the rails when the male creators find out that their fanbase is comprised mainly of women and subsequently lose their shit. It’s not that I disagree with anything written in the post (Steven Moffat in particular is almost hilariously transparent about how he hates the fact that women enjoy his work) but it also doesn’t take into account stuff like the Sherlock fandom’s obsession with shipping, the way they came up with an elaborate conspiracy theory that argued a secret fourth episode would air after the show’s finale, and how a fair amount of them seem convinced that Benedict Cumberbatch’s wife has faked all three of her pregnancies.
In light of that, a part of you feels that some creators can’t be blamed for thinking female viewers are lunatics, and despite Carvan’s insistence that engagement in fandom fills women with purpose and joy, it’s pretty obvious that in some cases, their obsession has curdled into hate and frustration.
In conclusion, I’m in a strange place when it comes to what’s discussed throughout this book, and as I read, I was continually trying to glean some insight into how I should feel about it all. On the one hand, of course I agree with Carvan’s thesis, that women of any age should be able to enjoy things without shame. On the other, I do think that a lot of the behaviour that’s described in this book is rather silly. Spending thousands of dollars on paraphernalia? Screaming yourself hoarse at concerts? Chasing celebrities down the street? Is it not completely gender-neutral to think that this type of thing is just absurd?
But the book itself is food for thought, and there are plenty of zingers throughout. It’s only fair to let Carvan have the final word, in which she points out that merely having something that you enjoy – anything! – in your life is no bad thing, and that women are just as entitled to this type of pleasure as men are:
The fandom experience is more about ourselves than the inspiring objects. Some trivial things can have profound consequences not in spite of being trivial but because it IS. Because it’s fun, it doesn’t matter, it’s purely for you, it feels good. That feeling seeps into the rest of your life.
Twelfth Night (1996)
This was our mandated Shakespeare play back in high school, and between watching this adaptation in Ms Dwan’s English class and having a VCR copy of it recorded off the television at home, there’s a good chance I’ve seen this movie more times than any other human being on earth.
Sebastian and Viola are twins, parted by a storm at sea, and washed up separately on the island of Illyria, which bears an uncommon resemblance to early 19th century Cornwall, a land at war with their own. To protect herself, Viola disguises herself as a boy and puts herself in the employ of the Duke Orsino, who is gloomily in love with Olivia, a noblewoman who spurns his attentions.
Viola – now Caesario – is sent along as the Duke’s emissary to present his case, only for Olivia to take a shine to him in his master’s place. Now Viola is trying to hide her growing feelings for Orsino, fend off Olivia’s advances, and protect herself from any other suitors who deem her a threat to their own hope of an advantageous marriage.
Meanwhile, Sebastian has safely made it to sure, and with the help of a crewman called Antonio, is gradually making his way inland, hoping to find news of his lost sister. And since he’s her identical twin brother, you can imagine the hijinks that ensue once he wanders into the cross-gender love triangle.
As with most Shakespeare comedies, there are two distinct plots at work: the romantic entanglements of the nobility, and the mischief-making of the lower class. In the latter case, the broad comedy falls to Olivia’s uncle Toby Belch, who has brought his own would-be suitor to seek Olivia’s hand, Andrew Aguecheek. Having been insulted one too many times by his niece’s steward Malvolio, he and his posse (including the jester Feste and the lady's maid Maria) contrive to make him believe that Olivia is in love with him. More hijinks ensue.
Whenever the time comes to adapt one of Shakespeare’s comedies for the movies, the director must grapple with the dual nature of these two plots, binding them into a single narrative even though the tone is bound to be very different (and it’s even more pronounced in The Merchant of Venice). This is unsurprising, since they were originally designed to appeal to two very different audiences: the nobility in the expensive seats, and the unwashed masses in the pit.
The interesting thing about this take on the proceedings, is that director Trevor Nunn choses to infuse the bawdy part of the proceedings with a very bittersweet undertone (emphasis on the bitter). By the end of the story, Toby and Andrew’s friendship is in ruins, Feste is off by himself again, and it’s made very clear that everyone involved went way too far with their prank on Malvolio.
It feels like a completely different story than that of the mixed-up lovers, who manage to reach a happy ending, singing and dancing with joy while the rest of the cast wander off into loveless marriages, self-imposed exile, or loneliness.
Speaking of the lovers, Imogen Stubbs is technically the protagonist of this storyline, and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with her performance – it’s just that somewhere along the way she’s totally eclipsed by the star power of Toby Stephens and Helena Bonham Carter. Stephens in particular is a perfect Orsino – melancholic and overdramatic, in love with the idea of love, and finally getting a clue once all identities have been revealed. Carter gets the difficult task of falling in love with Caesario and then going “oh well, I guess the identical twin brother will do” once the truth is out, though at least she gets to wear some gorgeous costumes along the way, and I’ve always been moved by her rather embarrassed: “a sister, you are she” line to Viola at the end.
I mean, the whole point of this play is that love is just a game to these folks, and that mix-and-matching your partners doesn’t make a heck of a lot of difference in the end. Methinks there are a lot of swinging parties in their future.
To the costumer’s (or makeup artist’s) credit, Imogen Stubbs does actually pass as a boy once she’s in her disguise, though naturally the audience will have to lend their suspension of disbelief to the proceedings when Steven Mackintosh turns up and is frequently mistook for “Caesario,” even though he’s a full head taller than his sister. But the scenery is gorgeous as well, even though it’s a far cry from the Italian coastline, with a strange, melancholy, fairy tale ambiance to it all.
I’ve come back to this movie decades after a period of compulsive rewatching, and it still held up.
The Merchant of Venice (2004)
The most striking difference between this and the above adaptation of Twelfth Night, is that it places itself in the “correct” setting as described by the play itself – that is, Venice in 1596. Unlike Twelfth Night, in which the backdrop is fairly superfluous, you really can’t stage The Merchant of Venice anywhere else, so deeply dependent is it on this particular time and place. Heck, it's in the title!
An opening placard informs us that the Jews who live in the city state of Venice are required to dwell in the walled foundry, or Geto (from which we derive the word “ghetto”) of the city, which is guarded by Christians every night. On leaving the ghetto, Jews have to wear a red hat to identify themselves, and because they're forbidden to own property, they make money through usury, the loaning of money with interests. Doing so makes them essential components of the city’s economy, while at the same time fermenting no small amount of resentment towards them, given that this practice is forbidden by Christian law.
So, in case you were wondering whether this adaptation was going to cast Shylock as a villain or a sympathetic character – there’s your answer. I’m being facetious, because even Shakespeare made room for a sympathetic reading, what with the character’s famous “if you prick us, do we not bleed?” monologue, but this goes even further by dramatizing the moment that Antonio spits on Shylock in the marketplace (it’s only referenced in the play) and having Jessica’s line: “becoming Christian and your loving wife” accompanied by a thunderclap of doom.
Watching this story unfold with Shylock as its protagonist is to once again grapple with the no-win scenario that all oppressed minorities are faced with. To not fight back is to keep enduring the abuse. To take revenge is to “prove” their assumptions about you. To try and prove your humanity to those that hate you is a fool’s game. The inevitable question that arises when it comes to Shylock’s determination to extract a pound of flesh from Antonio is – what should he have done?
The play lays down pretty clearly that the right course of action is for Shylock to show mercy. But would that have improved the way Venetians treated him? Probably not. What if he had made his “if you prick us, do we not bleed?” speech to the courtroom? Would that have moved them? It would have granted him the moral high ground at least, which is what the Christians claim when the tables are turned on Shylock and it’s decreed that his punishment won’t be physical harm, but conversion to Christianity.
A part of you can’t help but root for Shylock’s vengeance after all the shit he’s been put through (much like Catherine Sloper’s “I have been taught by masters,” Shylock’s “the villainy you teach me I will execute” is a line for the ages) though another agonizing wrinkle to the proceedings is that the courthouse is filled with Jews, and more than one reaction shot has them clearly grappling with the understanding that Shylock’s behaviour is inevitably going to fall back on them.
Such is the nature of this story that you can switch out Jews for any other minority group, and end up with the same exhaustive results: that hate begets hate, no one gains anything, and the cycle of violence never ends.
In light of that, it seems almost bewildering that this play contains a whole other plot involving a fairy tale courtship, a courtroom drama won by a pair of crossdressers, and a pair of star-crossed lovers. Portia is a wealthy heiress in Belmont, whose entire fortune and estate will pass to the control of her husband, who will be whoever successfully solves the riddle left in her father’s will. Each suitor is given the chance to chose from one of three caskets – one gold, one silver, one lead – and win her hand if their choice opens to reveal Portia’s portrait.
Being well-versed in the nature of fairy tales, we already know that the correct answer is the lead casket, and that this whole test of character would have been so much cooler if Portia herself had come up with it, but the story intersects with the Shylock drama in two ways: firstly through Antonio taking the loan from Shylock in order to give his friend Bassanio the opportunity to try his hand, and secondly when Portia and her maid Nerissa disguise themselves as lawyers in order to (successfully) defend Antonio in court.
It doesn’t change the fact that Portia’s story feels like it belongs in a completely different play than Shylock’s, for as with Twelfth Night, the sincerity of the romance doesn’t mesh with the cynicism of the courtroom. As Roger Ebert says, when Jessica runs away from home, it’s almost like she’s escaping from a tragedy into a comedy, especially when the whole thing wraps up on a trick the women pull on their new husbands, in which they extract a promise from them to never give up the rings they’ve been given, only to then demand them as payment while they’re in the guise of the lawyers (why do women insist on testing men like this? You’re just setting yourself up for disappointment).
Perhaps in light of this, even the love stories are infused with a level of sardonic commentary. Lorenzo is quick to reaffirm his love after seeing the casket of coins Jessican throws down to him, just in case, you know, anybody thinks his feelings aren’t based in genuine love for the lady, while Portia and Nerissa exchange some very amusing side-eyes when their husbands start declaring that they’d wish their wives dead if it meant someone in heaven would defend Antonio. Naturally, neither Bassanio nor Gratiano recognize their wives in the courtroom – I’d call them idiots, but to be fair, they’ve only known these women for about twenty minutes.
As befits a Shakespeare adaptation, the cast is pretty stacked: Joseph Fiennes does his usual thing of seducing everyone with the intensity of his gaze (that’s mild sarcasm, he’s a touch-and-go actor for me) while Lynn Collins is regal and remote as Portia. Jeremy Irons is the titular Merchant of Venice, whose infamous melancholy is explained by being clearly in love with Bassanio (I’m not sure I buy this – the whole point of his gloom is that it’s unexplained, and being in unrequited love gives him more sympathy than he necessarily deserves) and Zuleikha Robinson is given short-shrift as Jessica. Neither the original play nor this adaptation tries to explain why she does what she does to her father, though this version offers her a little bit of grace at the end – turns out she didn’t trade her mother’s ring for a monkey after all, but kept it.
Familiar faces such as McKenzie Crook and David Harewood pop up in small roles (certainly wasn’t excepting to see them!) while Kris Marshall makes for a pretty perfect Gratiano.
But obviously, the film belongs to Al Pacino – what more can I say?
Game Night (2018)
I’ve had this one on my radar for a while, and it’s pretty much what I expected: a screwball comedy which manages to keep up its momentum for the duration of the runtime, even if events get increasingly absurd towards the finish line. But it’s fun, and that’s all it needs to be.
Jason Bateman and Rachel McAdams are pleasant-enough suburbanites who were brought together by their shared competitive spirit (he proposed to her via charades). Now happily married, they’re trying to start a family – though McAdams believes their inability to conceive has to do with her husband’s hangups about his much more successive older brother, played by Kyle Chandler.
Cue game night, where their usual friend group (Lamorne Morris, Kylie Banbury, Billy Magnussen and Sharon Horgan – please don’t ask me to remember their character names) meet at Chandler’s opulent home for a game night they’ll never forget – or so he promises.
You already know the premise. Because they’ve been told to expect an elaborate role-playing mystery game, nobody blinks an eye when a group of armed men break into the house, assault their host, and carry him off into the night. It’s only when they start following the clues into progressively stranger circumstances that they realize Chandler is in actual danger, and agree to team up to rescue him.
Highlights include Jesse Plemons as the weirdo cop neighbour, McAdams trying to operate on a real bullet wound in her husband’s arm, and the sight of two happy couples (one married, one long-term) just hanging out and enjoying each other’s company.
The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021)
Loved this one. LOVED IT. This would work so well as a double-feature with David Lowery’s The Green Knight, as both films have that unsettling, stage-like atmosphere that can’t really be described in words.
Macbeth is my favourite Shakespeare tragedy, mostly because I’m fascinated by my own desire to see Macbeth and his wife succeed, even though they’re terrible people. It leaves me with an uncomfortable, crawly feeling of knowing I want them to get away with regicide, even though if I did such a thing, I’d be sick with guilt. Heck, I feel guilty when I take the last biscuit from the packet. But Macbeth’s depiction of being tempted with what you want most, of going through with something heinous, and then grappling with it forever afterwards always sends me into a hot flush.
Shot entirely in black and white, there is a deliberate stagey ambiance to this particular production. Even in exterior scenes, where you can see the horizon (or at least rolling hills in the distance) there is a sense of cramped quarters, of the limited scope that comes with perfect symmetry. Often actors stand in the dead-centre of the shot (which is off-putting, as we subconsciously expect them to be slightly to the left or right of frame) or stride out of the gloom directly toward the audience, not stopping until they’re in close-up. It’s so disconcerting, and it’s fantastic.
Supplementing my unease when it comes to secretly rooting for Macbeth’s success, is the fact that Denzel Washington and Frances McDormand are in the lead roles. How can we not root for such an illustrious power couple? They’re in complete command of the language and their characters, and create with just their body language a long and happy marriage.
Somehow even more compelling is Kathryn Hunter as the Weird Sisters, who with her raspy voice and contortionist physicality, is eerie and frightening and awe-inspiring. Director Joel Cohen makes some fascinating choices with how her character is portrayed, first by how she unfurls her body like a hermit crab coming out of its shell, with her sister-selves seen only as reflections in a nearby pool of water, to her shadowed visage peering down on Macbeth from castle parapets like a carrion crow. It’s hard to believe she’s the same actress currently playing Syril Karn’s henpecking mother on Andor.
There’s also an intriguing expansion on the character of Ross, who goes from little more than a messenger in the play to a full-blown chess-master figure here, watching all and saying nothing, involved in events like the murder of Banquo and the fruitless attempt to warn Lady MacDuff, but also (original to this film) in sparing Fleance’s life and hiding him in safety until the time is right.
This is one for a dark and stormy night, and it brought so many new angles and interpretations to the Shakespeare play I’ve probably seen more than any other. I’m already looking forward to seeing it again.
The Tudors: Season 1 (2007)
Ah, The Tudors. Remember how we all relentlessly mocked it back in the day for essentially being a soap opera trying to pass itself off as a serious historical drama, despite all the shocking swerves and gratuitous sex scenes? Now compared to the plethora of Phillipa Gregory adaptations, it’s practically highbrow, especially with the likes of Sam Neill and Jeremy Northam on board to bring some serious theatre acting to the proceedings. (And honestly, there’s not even as much nudity as you’d expect outside of the pilot, especially in the wake of current HBO shows – though I suppose you could accuse it of paving the way).
Despite Jonathan Rhys Meyers’ voiceover stating that to understand a story, “you have to go back to the beginning,” purporting the whole thing to be a prequel of some kind, the show starts where most stories about the King Henry the Eighth do: with the Great Matter. Desperate to have a son and certain that the window of that possibility has closed on his wife Catherine, Henry starts the long and arduous journey to have his marriage annulled so that he can marry the beguiling Anne Boleyn.
We all know how this ends, but the machinations of this particular period of time are always fascinating to watch. If they were fiction, they’d be derided as too unrealistic. Starting with the assassination of the English Ambassador in France, the first season doesn’t manage to chew everything that it’s bitten off, with a range of subplots and side-issues that are either dropped or irrelevant to the main action. You can tell showrunner Michael Hirst is experimenting a little, and a lot of his tells were carried over into Vikings, especially in the plotting.
It's almost like the show wants to give you a buffet of stuff that was going on at the time, some of it based in history, some that’s complete contrivance, all of which is thrown at the wall to see what will stick. Certain characters (like Mary Boleyn and Bessy Blount) are introduced as major players and then disappear entirely. Subplots are woven through a few episodes and then dropped. Entire scenes are just there with no bearing on whatever else is going on.
If there is a central thoroughfare, it’s the opposing desires and duties of Henry, Catherine, Anne and Cardinal Wolsey, with a few hangers-on that are loyal to one or more of these major players. Henry wants his divorce. Catherine refuses to budge. Anne is egged on by her father and brother to seduce the king, but refuses to settle on being a mistress; gambling instead for wifehood.
Meanwhile, Wolsey is caught between wanting to serve his king and remaining true to God, unable to do both and so torn apart as a result. He doesn’t like Anne. Catherine doesn’t like him. The king’s moods are mercurial and he’s compromised in more than one regard. It is an absolute quagmire of a scenario, and it’s hardly surprising when people start dying.
The rise and fall of Anne Boleyn will always be gripping, and though this season charts her rise, the story taken together with her fall from grace in season two makes for a compelling arc of television. The first half of her story almost feels like a sordid Mills and Boon, in which your fictional stand-in becomes the object of obsession and desire of none other but the king himself, who turns the world upside down in order to marry you, showering you with gifts and power and prestige along the way.
Then reality sets in. The king soon loses interest, you cannot produce a male heir, and the fiery nature that your husband once found so captivating becomes a serious liability in a time where obedience and silence were the traits most highly prized in a woman. I’m reminded of a quote in a book I read when I was a child and never forgot: “a man wants a woman with spirit before marriage; afterwards he just wants someone to say ‘yes dear.’”
In this case, it’s fascinating to realize that the entirety of Henry and Anne’s relationship is built on the obstacles between them and the drama of them not being able to consummate their love/lust. Once those hurdles have been surmounted, they have nothing left to talk about; no angst left to fuel their passion. (And of course, no male issue).
As ever, it’s fun to see a range of familiar faces minus the passage of twenty years, who at the time were up-and-comers. Natalie Dormer and Henry Cavill in particular benefited immensely from this show, the former because she’s a genuine powerhouse as Anne Boleyn, and the latter because... well, he’s very handsome, isn’t he. It also made me smile to see none other than Matt Ryan in a minor capacity, many years before he settled into his iconic cross-media role as John Constantine.
King Henry VIII has ended up being one of Jonathan Rhys Meyers’ seminal roles (where has he been lately? I feel like I haven’t seen him in ages) and despite the lack of physical resemblance to the historical personage he’s playing, he certainly captures the bearing and temperament of a king – especially a young king who is just starting to test the limits of his power. The show takes plenty of liberties with age and chronology here (they cast a much older Catherine of Aragon, which is rather unfair since there was only six years between them) in order to work their own angles on recorded history.
Which means that Henry is someone who is introduced making a serious speech to his court, then excusing himself so he can “go play,” demonstrating he’s as interested in statecraft as he is in skirt chasing. I recall Jonathan Rhys Meyers saying of Maria Doyle Kennedy that she delivered one of the best portrayals of Queen Catherine of all time, and it’s difficult to disagree with that. She practically emanates sadness, even when she smiles, and carries herself with unfailing dignity and strength.
Meanwhile, Anne Boleyn and her sister are essentially pimped out to the king by their father, only for Anne to take matters into her own hands and deliberately play hard to get, knowing such tactics will work better than simply agreeing to be his mistress. The show is pretty much stolen by Natalie Dormer, who has an allure that can’t be denied. So often audiences are asked to believe that men are besotted with a certain woman (or visa versa) and aside from generic attractiveness, you’re left thinking – sure, I guess. But in this case, you can totally understand why Henry would be captivated.
That she’s a sexpot with white teeth and glossy hair is a bit of an eye-roller at first, and yet there’s conviction and intelligence and mystery in her unusual face – best of all, the show doesn’t cast her into the role of villainess, as so many depictions have done before her. This Anne is complex, as capable of sincerity as she is coquetry, clever in some matters but foolish in others, compassionate at some times and then cuttingly cruel. It’s obvious how she’s manipulated by her father into catching the king’s eye, only for her to become increasingly entranced by Henry’s attention, and then start to plot her own course when it becomes apparent how much power and prestige could be hers.
One scene has Catherine directly confront her about her relationship with the king, and the extraordinary thing about it is that you cannot take sides. Catherine is the wronged wife, and yet Anne has been given little choice about the position she’s currently in. Neither is ashamed of who they are, and neither will budge an inch from what they truly believe is right. It’s actually rather astonishing that we were afforded this level of nuance for two female rivals in 2007.
On that note, history seldom creates narrative structure, but the show manages to thread together a theme of how profoundly dangerous it was for women in these times. The men are politicking, but the women are fighting for their lives, knowing all the while that a man’s favour could be the difference between life and death. There’s a grim tragedy in watching an array of beauties desperately try to one-up each other, knowing it’s all for men who will eventually cast them aside.
There are other notable features to the show – this must have been one of the last shows/films to have actual colours before the whole grim, washed-out, everything-looks-like-shit aesthetic became the norm, because I was astounded at how bright and glorious everything looked. It also has a beautiful soundtrack, and prolonged opening credits. Opening credits! Remember those? With people posing as their characters while their names appeared on-screen beside them? Man, I miss a good opening credit sequence. Also, for whatever reason, episodes have insanely long “previously on” segments.
It's a strong start to what remains a very silly show in many respects, but which unabashedly leans into the melodrama of it all. In a way, that is its strength: by presenting itself as a depiction of history that is not to be taken seriously under any circumstances, it can surprise you when the truly emotional (and deadly serious) moments arrive.
The Terror: Season 1 (2018)
This one has been lurking at the corners of my awareness for some time now, but a Tumblr mutual recently started posting about it in earnest, which was as good a reason as any to check it out for myself. Based on the book of the same name by Dan Simmons, which in turn was a fictionalized account of the real disappearance of the ships HMS Terror and Erebus in 1845, this charts the slow descend of those involved from civilization into chaos, mutiny and cannibalism, with a side helping of nihilism, existentialism and a giant monster that looks like a polar bear. Fun stuff!
It's certainly not something you’d want to watch if you’re in search of lightweight entertainment, as this production doesn’t stint on the hardships that the two crews undergo during their ill-fated expedition to find the Northwest Passage (and neither does the show let you forget that all of this horror is in pursuit of economy and the empire).
Two things I found somewhat amusing, the first being that (like a lot of people, seemingly) I was under the impression that the monster would be more of a metaphor than an actual physical being – a symbol of hubris, of corruption, of the unforgiving Artic waste. But nope, it’s a real creature that really does chow down on a significant number of characters.
The second is that I noticed a lot of other viewers complaining about how difficult it was to tell all these white male characters with similar facial hair and identical uniforms apart, which is where my extensive television-watching history finally paid-off, since I had no trouble at all. That’s the guy from The Borgias! And that’s the guy from The Musketeers! And the other one from Sanditon! And Jack Randall from Outlander! Pretty much every single supporting player from Game of Thrones, not to mention Professor Quirrell, Merlin’s dad, and King Pharazôn. Oh, and Liam Garrigan, who’s been in a ton of things, but usually as a despicable character. It’s nice to see him as a sweet guy for a change.
And of course, Jared Harris and Ciarán Hinds, who everyone should know. It’s not exactly something to be proud of, as God only knows how many hours of sitting on the couch this recognitive skill required, but in all honesty, the actor playing Cornelius Hickey was the only one I don’t think I’ve seen before.
Like I said, it’s certainly not a romp in the park, and it’s definitely not for everyone. There are gruesome injuries, miserable deaths, horrific violence, and a slow, steady march toward annihilation. Not to spoil anything, since the first very scene establishes this fact, but nobody makes it out of the Arctic alive. And yet, for all of that, this is not a soul-crushing experience to watch. It’s hard to explain how or why exactly, but there are moments of kindness and grace and mercy that somehow feel all the more powerful for occurring in the midst of such depredation.
(Well, maybe not that hard to explain, as it’s clearly the contrast between the two states that make the scenes of genuine compassion so striking).
It’s also a show that refuses to compromise with its characters and the world they live in: these men are completely devoted to king and country, and are baffled at the thought of anyone not adhering to the superiority of their own belief system. Alongside scenes of camaraderie with each other, are ugly instances of homophobia and racism.
It's obviously also not a woman-centric show, though the likes of Greta Sacchi, Siân Brooke and (especially) Nive Nielsen manage to make a big impression with the screentime they’re given.
My one complaint is that given the show commits to the reality of the creature and the effects of its rampages, I wish they had offered a little more explanation regarding what exactly it was. It’s easy to connect some of the dots (that it only attacks after a crewman accidentally kills an Inuit shaman, that one must sacrifice their own tongue in order to control it) but we end up learning very little about its origins and purpose. And sure, Nothing is Scarier, but... well I was curious, that’s all.
I would recommend, as it’s a beautifully put-together production with excellent writing and a cast that brings its A-game... but you certainly have to be in the right frame of mind to enjoy appreciate it. Maybe don’t watch it if there’s anything particularly stressful going on in your life, unless you need a reminder that at least things aren’t as bad as what happens to these guys.
A Discovery of Witches: Season 3 (2018)
Deborah Harkness’s All Souls trilogy reminds me so much of Kate Mosse’s Languedoc trilogy: a great premise, but a story in which absolutely nothing happens. And yet, something that would rightfully drive other people completely up the wall is something I find weirdly relaxing and dream-like (not withstanding yet another alpha male control-freak as a love interest).
It’s all about the vibes for me, a gentle aesthetic of autumnal colours, warm wraps, knitted jerseys, damp cobbled streets, leather-bound books. More than anything, this is what the television show captures, to the point where the existence of witches and vampires seems rather superfluous in comparison. I mean, all they do is stand around talking in elegant coats while moody covers of pop songs play on the soundtrack.
Either you get it, or you don’t. And that’s fine. Mostly I’m grateful and astonished that this show managed its full-season run. Three seasons for three books, with a clear beginning, middle and end. Wow. Do you know how rare that is these days?
It’s been a while since I lasted watched this show, so I only recalled the major plot-points of the story in its entirety: the powers of witches, vampires and demons are weakening and no one knows why. Everyone is on the hunt for the Book of Life, a manuscript that may hold the solution to the above mystery, though three crucial pages are missing from it. Diana Bishop (a witch) and Matthew de Clairmont (vampire) have fallen in love and married; now Diana is pregnant with twins – something seen as an aberration to the rest of the supernatural community, including the inevitable Council of Dour Elders.
Oh, and there’s something called a “bloodrage vampire” on the loose; a creature that’s not in control of his own bloodlust and so killing discriminately, thereby drawing unwanted attention from the human world.
The show had bitten off a lot of plots that required wrapping up, and the odd structuring of the seasons themselves didn’t exactly inspire confidence (the first season had eight episodes, the second ten, and the third seven) but as someone who was just a casual fan and has not yet read The Book of Life, the final book in the trilogy, I was reasonably happy with what we got here. Like I said, I was mostly in it for the vibes.
Some things inevitably bugged me, either because they were cripplingly outdated (Diana is apparently the most powerful witch alive, and yet excruciatingly subservient to her husband), mildly offensive (there are two gay couples on this show, and each one has to suffer the death of their partner) or just plain silly (why on earth are the offspring of a witch and vampire being Christened in a church?)
Some plots come to a fairly anticlimactic conclusion (we learn the identity of the bloodrage vampire, which is a solid twist, but then nothing comes of it) or are simply left dangling (a lot of effort is put into Matthew trying to make amends with a New Orleans coven of vampires, which again leads to nothing, not even a big battle sequence). And don't get me started on Satu Järvinen, easily the show’s most interesting character, complete with a prophecy that could just as easily refer to her as it does to Diana – dispatched in a matter of seconds. In hindsight, what was even the point of this character?
Oh, and they’ve switched out the actors for Baldwin de Clairmont, presumably so the old one could go be King Pharazôn on Rings of Power, but it still bugs me when this happens.
And yet, I still enjoyed it. Like I said, a lot of that probably has to do with my bemusement that it was allowed to come to a proper conclusion, and there are a lot of highlights along the way. I actually kind of appreciated that the main conflict of the story was handled with discussion instead of violence (it worked a lot better than in Twilight at any rate) and Diana does get to demonstrate the full breadth of her magical abilities in the final episode.
All the actors are endearingly po-faced about the fact they’re playing vampires and witches, subject matter that has long-since become the domain of turgid YA dramas, and there’s a surprising amount of talent at work here: Matthew Goode is obviously the biggest name, but also Alex Kingston, Lindsay Duncan and Sophia Myles (whatever happened to her?) Oh, and I loved Steven Cree as Gallowglass, because I’m a sucker for a good unrequited love story.
I’m not sure if the series as a whole would qualify as Dark Academia, but I do love the central conceit of a magical book that can only be retrieved from the closed stacks by a specific person, and so anything that involved the retrieval of The Book of Life and the search for its hidden pages was compelling to this die-hard bookworm. I can’t fully recommend, but if you know what you’re getting yourself into, there is satisfaction to be found. And if nothing else, it drew my attention to the books.
X-Men ‘97: Season 1 (2024)
I am forever complaining about the conveyor belt of relentless reboots and remakes and prequels and sequels and legacy-quels, and yet every once in a while, something will come along to justify their existence. Andor, the prequel to a prequel, is the best Star Wars related media of all time, while Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, is an exceptionally clever and heartfelt sequel to a spin-off to a franchise that was never that great to begin with.
Miracles can happen if the right talent is in the driver’s seat, and that was certainly the case with X-Men ’97, a continuation of the nineties show that brings back many of the show’s original voice cast. And whereas the original series adapted many (if not most) of the famous storylines involving these characters from the comic books, this continuation dives headfirst into contemporary social commentary... and takes no prisoners.
Whether it’s the January 6th rioters storming Capitol Hill or the Pulse nightclub shooting, politicians playing the “both sides” card to the radicalization of online hate groups, there are references to current events in nearly every episode, as well as lines of dialogue that make you blink and think: “did they really just say that?” Yes, they did. And neither does the show hold the audiences’ hand – at one point Professor X is having a conversation that references Rudyard Kipling, to which he says: “he was possessed of many burdens, none of them real.”
I did a spit-take, and then had to explain to my friend the significance of The White Man’s Burden, something he had no idea even existed, and wouldn’t have if he’d been watching by himself, since the show makes no further attempt to elaborate on the reference. It’s kind of amazing.
Neither does the show stint on the visuals or the emotional stakes – it depicts nothing less than a full-blown genocide and its aftermath, exploring the horror and consequences of war and what it does to people. The imagery can get very intense at times, and for that we can thank the animators at Studio Mir (who were also behind The Legend of Korra) who put in some incredible work – a far cry from the frankly hideous animation that so often marred the original series.
It picks up almost immediately after the events of the 1997 finale, in which Professor X is jettisoned off into space after a life-threatening illness and his students are left to fend for themselves in the School for Gifted Youngsters. Turns out that Xavier’s will bequeaths his entire fortune and legacy to Magneto, who is more than happy to take control of the X-Men despite their mistrust of him.
And all your favourites are here: Professor X and Magneto, Cyclops and Jean, Gambit and Rogue, Storm and Beast. Wolverine is mercifully not made out to be the main character this time around, and semi-newcomer Morph (who appeared only sporadically as a team member in the original series) is given a fresh new characterization. Despite the moaning and complaining from the usual suspects at the news he would be non-binary, and ends up being one of the best characters.
Jubilee gets paired with another newcomer, Roberto da Costa (or Sunspot) who is very much the Audience Surrogate for this reintroduction to the series, going through the expected beats of a Coming Out Story, while Scott and Jean get to enjoy a brand-new love triangle with a pregnant clone called Madelyne Pryor who replaced the real Jean at some unspecified point by Mr Sinister. Just another day at the X-Mansion!
Meanwhile, Storm gets her own subplot in which she’s robbed of her powers and retreats to the desert in order to recuperate. When she first appeared, my friend asked: “do you think she’ll be as over-the-top in this show as she was in the first?” which was immediately followed by her stepping forth to the booming of thunder and announcing: “ANCIENT SANDS, HEED MY COMMAND!” So, yes. I mean, it’s not the X-Men if everyone isn’t being as dramatic as possible at all times.
But my favourites have always been Gambit and Rogue. They might well be my very first ship, well before I even knew what shipping was, and perhaps the source of my fondness for lovable rogues and vulnerable tough-girls. And then of course, they managed to completely break my heart. (I’m not going to lose too much hope though, especially with that final stinger).
My one complaint is that they churn through so much material that it’s difficult to process what’s going on before the next life-changing event transpires – and we’re talking about some pretty intense shit! Babies are born and then promptly sent to the future. Team members are exposed as clones and then carry on emotional affairs with those remaining in the mansion. Jubilee gets sucked into a video game on her eighteenth birthday and then... just kind of gets over it. Slow down is all I’m saying!
I’m still mostly tired of superheroes, and probably still would have preferred a continuation of Wolverine and the X-Men (which ended on a much more intriguing cliffhanger) but the X-Men have always been my superheroes, and having them back like this was an unexpected joy. This continuation exceeded all expectations, and I can’t wait for season two.
Fool Me Once (2024)
It was Mother’s Day, and my mother loves these sorts of dramas, so it was a no-brainer that I would buy some of her favourite snacks and then binge-watch this with her.
Maya is a recently widowed ex-army helicopter pilot who (as we soon discover) was discharged from service after a botched mission ended with several civilians killed in a missile strike. More recently, she’s been struggling with the deaths of both her sister Claire and her husband Joe, each one murdered in seemingly unrelated incidences, but in surprisingly quick succession: Claire during a botched burglary at her home, and Joe during a walk in the local park at night.
Now she’s trying to raise her young daughter Lily as best she can, fending off a mother-in-law from hell, the rest of her husband’s rather unstable family, and her sister’s increasingly drunken husband (who has had two children with Claire, Maya’s niece and nephew).
And then, the hook: a friend of Maya gifts her a nanny cam hidden within a picture frame so she can see what her daughter is up to while she’s out of the house. It seems harmless enough, but when Maya sits down to watch the footage, she’s gobsmacked to see her husband Joe in the living room, giving his daughter a cuddle. On confronting the nanny, Maya is pepper-sprayed in the face, and on recovering, realizes that the nanny has absconded with the cam’s hard-drive.
And so the investigation begins, down many a twisty branch of inquiry. Where to start? It won’t surprise many to discover that the deaths of Claire and Joe are linked, and that the out-of-her-depth protagonist ends up being more effective than any professional investigator in following up leads and questioning suspects.
She’s partially joined by the requisite gruff police detective, who suspects Maya of killing her husband, but is beset on all sides by conflicting bits of evidence (he’s also suffering from some kind of medical condition that causes blackouts, a subplot I initially thought was an irrelevant bit of character drama given his impending nuptials, only for it to tie in surprisingly nicely – albeit coincidentally – to the rest of the plot).
This is my third Harlan Coben adaptation, and by this point it’s amusing to recognize his tells. I suppose every author has them; a bag of tricks they delve into over and over again, but in this case he’s not subtle when it comes to using his favourite plot devices. After just three miniseries based on his work, I know to expect the following: a. a mysterious, tragic event that happened twenty years ago, b. probably at a boarding school that the deceased character attended in their youth, c. a cop that may or may not be corrupt, d. a subplot involving tweens leading an investigation of their own (which will probably end up being completely superfluous), e. the protagonist discovering that their loved one(s) lived a double life, f. the presence of Richard Armitage (in the Netflix adaptations at least).
It's the Harlan Coben formula: you either shut your brain off and go with it, or it drives you mad.
Random trivia: this month I saw Nicholas Farrell in Twelfth Night and Fool Me Once, playing a minor role each time, twenty-eight years apart.
I enjoy the Tennant/Tate Much Ado, but I don't think anything will every dislodge the Branagh/Thompson version from my heart. It was interested to see that two of the things you mentioned from this production (Don Pedo being the outlier at the celebration, and the line reading of "Love Me? Why?") are also found in the Branagh film!
ReplyDeleteI've always wanted to watch the Delacourte production, so thanks for the link.
Kathryn Hunter - what a chameleon (LOVED her in Andor). She is also incredible as Puck in Julie Taymor's A Midsummer Night's Dream (that also has an excellent David Harewood as Oberon)
The Tudors is Good Actually is a hill I will die on. I think it knew what it was and was happy playing fast and loose with historical fact while getting the essence pretty correct. It's surprisingly nuanced and sympathetic to all the characters rather than picking a "side" as so many seem to do now. And what a cast, despite a few oddities (Callum Blue aka Zod from Smallville in the credits yet disappearing without a trace). Even Steven Waddington from Robin Hood showing up as Buckingham!
Re: Much Ado About Nothing. Interesting, I remember Don Pedro not joining in the final dance, but not the restructuring of the "love me? Why?" line in Branagh. I'll have to rewatch!
DeleteOoh, will definitely check out Julie Taymor's MND... in fact, I think I have it downloaded somewhere...
Yes, there are plenty of oddities in the Tudors reel of regulars. See also: the composer who has his own little subplot throughout season one, and then just disappears. What was up with that?