Post by BrƎИsꓘi on Jan 15, 2022 22:49:32 GMT
No spoilers, no plot lines, just this:
It may only be January, but Television in 2022 is going to have to go all-out to come close to this. After Life has been an utterly emotional and profoundly deep watch. Season 3 carries on where 2 left off.
Do not miss this one folks. Gervais has shown (again) a writer's brilliance for understanding and illustrating the rawness of bereavment with understated class. Anyone who has ever lost anyone close to them will completely identify with this cruelest of all human conditions. Forget the seven stages of grief - Gervais (somehow) nails every aspect of the pain, loss, isolation, gallows humour and pathos that we all feel when we lose someone so close to us - with one key ingredient: The complete lack of personal edit button. How many of us who have lost a loved one bottle up all of the frustrations and anger that come with grave loss? Surely, this is the one time in our lives we should be excused any amount of bad behaviour? As "Tony" does in After Life, letting it out is the best personal medicine - it doesn't fix anything, but it goes a tiny way in the direction of redress.
Tony's flaws are actually a superpower. Realising the Meaning of Life (spoiler - it ain't 42, this time) and how our lives/deaths are interwoven to folk we may not even consider ourselves close to, is such a deep observation.
And what a fastastic cast: Special shout outs to Diane Morgan and Joe Wilkinson (comedy geniuses, both), Ashley Jensen, Tom Basden, Tony Wa. Standout support comes from Penelope Wilton - talk about being able to portray empathy to perfection.
The final village fair scenes are a masterclass; pairing characters off (in one case with a new pet), a brilliantly dispensed meting of social justice and my own personal favourite - the recall of "Dog Waste Man" (actor Steve Speirs) - who provided the highlight gag from Season 2, Episode 5.
Oh, and as for the ending: If you get it, then you really do get it. There's such a brilliance about the "reveal" - a slow burner (at least 17½ episodes or so), revelation upon revelation, break after break, fix after fix, then boom! Wow
Gervais will NEVER top this one.
It may only be January, but Television in 2022 is going to have to go all-out to come close to this. After Life has been an utterly emotional and profoundly deep watch. Season 3 carries on where 2 left off.
Do not miss this one folks. Gervais has shown (again) a writer's brilliance for understanding and illustrating the rawness of bereavment with understated class. Anyone who has ever lost anyone close to them will completely identify with this cruelest of all human conditions. Forget the seven stages of grief - Gervais (somehow) nails every aspect of the pain, loss, isolation, gallows humour and pathos that we all feel when we lose someone so close to us - with one key ingredient: The complete lack of personal edit button. How many of us who have lost a loved one bottle up all of the frustrations and anger that come with grave loss? Surely, this is the one time in our lives we should be excused any amount of bad behaviour? As "Tony" does in After Life, letting it out is the best personal medicine - it doesn't fix anything, but it goes a tiny way in the direction of redress.
Tony's flaws are actually a superpower. Realising the Meaning of Life (spoiler - it ain't 42, this time) and how our lives/deaths are interwoven to folk we may not even consider ourselves close to, is such a deep observation.
And what a fastastic cast: Special shout outs to Diane Morgan and Joe Wilkinson (comedy geniuses, both), Ashley Jensen, Tom Basden, Tony Wa. Standout support comes from Penelope Wilton - talk about being able to portray empathy to perfection.
The final village fair scenes are a masterclass; pairing characters off (in one case with a new pet), a brilliantly dispensed meting of social justice and my own personal favourite - the recall of "Dog Waste Man" (actor Steve Speirs) - who provided the highlight gag from Season 2, Episode 5.
Oh, and as for the ending: If you get it, then you really do get it. There's such a brilliance about the "reveal" - a slow burner (at least 17½ episodes or so), revelation upon revelation, break after break, fix after fix, then boom! Wow
Gervais will NEVER top this one.
