Spoiler-filled thoughts on the return of The Hour after the jump:
Let’s begin at the end.
Though The
Hour is a classy British period drama with high ambition, it still ends its
first episode of Season Two with pretty much the same revelation that ended the
first season of Friends. Freddie is
back, he’s been overseas and just as we think he and Bel might finally act on
all that sexual tension, we find out he’s brought back a gorgeous French wife
with a penchant for wearing oversized tops and not much else. And even though
the two characters on the end of this particular bait-and-switch are completely
different women from completely different eras in completely different shows, Bel
Rowley and Rachel Green react in pretty much the same way: pretending to be
pleased. None of this is a criticism of the end of this episode at all; it’s
merely something that amused me as I enjoyed the hell out of the return of The Hour.
It’s always a tricky balancing act for a
serialised drama like this one – especially one that ended its first season
with a revelation full of repercussions for every character – to return
proceedings to something approaching a status quo. At the end of Season One
everyone’s boss was revealed to be a Soviet spy, so you can’t really have
Hector, Bel and Freddie going about their daily business as if nothing had
happened the next day. The Hour decides
on a time jump, which reveals early on that:
- Freddie is no longer working with The Hour
- Bel is under a lot of pressure
- Hector is drinking, womanising and only just turning up on time
- There’s a new boss in town. (Peter Capaldi!!!)
- Clarence is in prison.
- McCain is still the stiff upper lip version of Snidely Whiplash.
There’s only vague mentions of the events
that unfolded in Season One, which is a shame because I was one person that
really enjoyed the mostly unpopular spy storyline from that season of The Hour, mainly because I thought it
complemented the excellent character work and period setting beautifully. Instead,
we spend a fair amount of time with Kiki Delaine, a blonde conquest of Hector’s
played by Hannah Tointon, who I thought I recognized but cannot for the life of
me work out where from. (Even IMDB didn’t help. I’m assuming it’s more likely
to be The Inbetweeners than Hollyoaks). This appears to be the
beginning of some sort of crime-based storyline, but I’ve got no real idea
where it’s going apart from Hector being in fairly deep strife at some point.
Other critics hate The Hour’s genre
aspirations - but I can’t get enough of them. As a result, I’ll reserve
judgment on where we’re going with this.
Having said all that, the main reason to
watch The Hour remains the fantastic
performances of the lead trio. Dominic West brings depth and charisma (and
handsomeness) to a man committed to being shallow and Romola Garai continues to
be one of my favourite female actresses working in television anywhere in the
world. Ben Whishaw is still the highlight, though, playing Freddie with the
kind of depth and intelligence one would expect from an actor long touted as
something special. He’s simply fantastic, turning a character that could have
long since been infuriating into one of the most fascinating and charismatic
presences on television.
The
Hour was one of my favourite shows of 2011, and
it’s not going anywhere. Even better, if you did happen to miss Season One, you
can probably jump on board here, maybe with a little bit of reading. Give it a
look.
Random Thoughts:
- It took me a minute to recognize Peter Capaldi, and I had him pegged as Alan Rickman lite early on. He does a lot with a little here, which is very promising for the remainder of the season.
- Sissy is now dating an African-American man, which catches the interest of some louts hanging around in the street. I’m sure that’s going to end well for everybody.
- I’m a little bit worried about Marnie. Oona Chaplin does a great job of portraying the soul-crushing boredom of, as she puts it: “Home making for someone who never comes home.” Some of those scenes at the end had me a bit worried for her safety.
- We’re also introduced to a staff member from Uncovered, an ITV program with designs on The Hour’s success, and their host. What’s more, this particular staff member has designs on Bel herself. (Who can blame him?)
- As you can see from the above, there’s a lot of table setting in Episode One. Hopefully it all pays off as well as most of Season One did.
No comments:
Post a Comment