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Reviews
Repeat Attenders (2020)
An exploitative, sad mess
There's a point about an hour into Repeat Attenders where the director decides to derail his own moderately competent documentary by platforming a man who repeatedly threatened to rape Debbie Gibson.
Almost all the subjects interviewed are being exploited for their mental illness, and the film is obviously pieced together from footage that was shot across an entire decade.
The whole thing is sad, joyless and unexpectedly dark. It's occasionally fascinating, but the extended interview with Debbie Gibson's stalker makes the film not worth anyone's time or money.
There's a great film to be made about Broadway fan culture and the people who sleep out for rush tickets, but this absolutely isn't it.
Better (2023)
The only thing wrong with Better is that the BBC pitched it as "the new Happy Valley".
The only thing wrong with Better is that the BBC pitched it as "the new Happy Valley". And because they did, the show got a weird audience and critical reception.
Line of Duty is incredible, right? But if someone promised you Happy Valley and you sat down to watch Line of Duty, I don't think you'd like it much. That's what's happening here.
This isn't Line of Duty. It isn't Happy Valley. Better is in a category of its own, and it stands as tall as either of those shows do.
Leila Farzad is astonishing, like she is in everything. But this is a brilliantly written game of chess that has you emotionally invested in all the pieces on the board.
You haven't seen this character arc in a cop show, and you haven't seen this story in a drama before.
(Also, I don't know how you even begin to write a second season after that ending, but my god do I want to see it.)
Gangs of London (2020)
Brilliant. Ignore the manbabies hating on it with their neckbeard takes on what a gangland drama should look like.
The storytelling on this show is beyond brilliant. Even the extended fight sequences are all about advancing the story, and they're all like Shakespearean tragedies in miniature. Every trope you've ever seen in screen violence is subverted. The maxim is "show, don't tell", and that seems to be gospel for the writers on Gangs of London.
Case in point: Season two begins with a ONE YEAR LATER title card. Shannon is in prison, but we don't get an explanation. We see she's getting released, but there's barely a word of dialogue. Nobody has a monologue full of catch-the-audience-up exposition. And then, at the end of the sequence, we get two words that tell us everything we need to know. The guard manning the last gate as she leaves prison looks at her and spits "cop killer". And bam-two words is all we need to understand everything that's going on. The writing on this show is magic.
If you think it's terrible, maybe it isn't for you. If you think Joe Cole is miscast as Sean Wallace, maybe what you want is a stupider show. It's pretty clear the creators intended for it to seem like Sean Wallace might not be up to the job. That's the constant tension. He wasn't built for it, but he was born into it. The show's about whether he can bridge that divide. Elliot's arc is the inverse: he wasn't born into it, but he *is* built for it. Sean has a family, but all he wants is to own London. Elliot could be king in a couple of weeks if he wanted it, but all he wants is a family.
To quote the show itself: can a pawn become a king? And can a king become a pawn?
I humbly suggest that if you're sitting in front of this show and you hate it, it's not that (as a bunch of reviews claim) everyone is miscast, the action is implausible and nobody can act. It is, simply, that you don't like it. Maybe it's just not for you.
If you want a complex, nuanced gangland drama but you're a manbaby who can't cope unless everyone in it (and every character arc) is a cliched idea of what you think organised crime looks and feels like, watch The Sopranos.
The Box (2021)
Intolerably stupid
Nothing about this show works. The writing is bizarre, the accents are wild, and the single indoor set the whole thing takes place on is like some community theatre idea of what an American police station looks like. Oh and the costumes, my god, the costumes. Hilarious.
The whole thing feels like a cutaway joke from 30 Rock.
If you like the idea of Anna Friel playing a detective with unmanaged PTSD, watch Marcella instead.
The Lake House (2006)
Ugh
This is the most hatefully stupid thing I have ever seen. I have listened to junkies tell stories that make more sense than this unforgivable dreck. Sandy B was good though.