Season 43 - Mr Selfridge Series 1 (2013)
Mr Selfridge is a series that really came into it's own over time. If it had kept on the self-indulgent and self-destructive trajectory of the first series it wouldn't have lasted beyond it's second series, and I wouldn't have watched another episode. Did anybody really want to watch the hallucinatory post car crash episode? NO! Well, probably Jeremy Piven, but no one else. Instead we were lucky enough to have four series, three of which understood that while Selfridge, the man and the establishment, were the glue that held the series together, it was really the supporting cast, the workers of said establishment, that made the show work. It was the romance of Henri and Agnes, Miss Mardle finding purpose in her life besides being Mr. Grove's mistress, Arthur Crabb just being Arthur Crabb, the unexpected alliance of Frank and Kitty, the machinations of Lord Loxley, the delights of Lady Mae, I could go on and on because there was so much to love in this show. But what really made the show click for me was that in series two, besides the tonal shift, I knew Rose Selfridge was on the way out. Here's the thing. Everyone has an actor or actress they just can't stand. Watching them is like having your eyes being slowly clawed out of their sockets or having really painful dental surgery. Well, for me, Frances O'Connor and that Jack Nicholson Joker-esque smile of hers is at the top of my hate list. The hate started for me with the horrific 1999 "adaptation" of Mansfield Park, of which the less said the better. My feelings were really solidified by the movie A.I., and well, the rest is history, as in, I historically and forevermore will hate her, no matter what, and I thank the stars above every day that the adaptation of the Locke and Key series with her as Nina wasn't picked up and want to hunt down whomever cast her on the second season of Wednesday, because how dare you pollute that gloriously dark show with her presence. Anyway, end rant. After the first series when the show was picked up for a second series I read a bit about Harry Gordon Selfridge to separate fact from fiction and see where this show might be headed and I saw that his beloved wife Rose, played by Frances O'Connor, died in the pandemic of 1918. Not good news for the real Rose, great news for me! All I had to do was get through her scenes in series two, which were minimized because of expanding the plotlines to include the supporting characters, and I'd be home free. Series three starts with a very welcome funeral. Sometimes the tragedies of life can make me happy and sometimes they can make me sad. Like the accusations against Jeremy Piven. While he's been tentatively welcomed back into film and television I will never watch him again. Which makes Mr Selfridge sadly something that will forever be in my past. I don't think I could ever bring myself to watch it again. So this is not only a salute to the show by a farewell. Listen to the victims and believe them. And never, ever, support abusers. Even if it means saying goodbye to something you once loved.
The British have such a love of their public schools that is equal parts nostalgia and trauma that they have immortalized it in print time and time again. Tom Brown's School Days is always the first that leaps to mind, but there are so many that I can name from those that embrace the genre, like Goodbye, Mr. Chips, to those that subvert the genre, particularly Ronald Searle with his St. Trinian's comics. You could even make a valid argument to include The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie amongst their numbers even if Wikipedia doesn't. Mr. Chipping has been depicted several times on screen by the great luminaries of the day, from Robert Donant, who won an Oscar for his portrayal, to Peter O'Toole, who sang and danced as Mr. Chips, to Roy Marsden, the most famous of all Dalglieshes. So why did the 2002 adaptation land on Martin Clunes? You have to remember that at this time he wasn't the household name he is now for portraying Dr. Martin Ellingham. "Doc Martin" was still very much in its nascence. Martin Clunes had played Dr. Martin Bamford in the film Saving Grace and the character had been re-contextualized for two television movies, only one of which had aired at this time, and which, in my mind, have almost nothing to do with the series. Other than that his career was almost all one-off episodes where his character was invariably along the lines of his portrayal of Barmy on Jeeves and Wooster or Anna Massey's ill-fated son on Inspector Morse. In other words, big-hearted and bumbling. A golden retriever or Labrador of a person. He comes in smiling with that big mobile mouth and his outsized ears and is just a ray of sunshine. And I honestly believe, from years of watching him, that this is exactly who he is as a person. In other words, the exact opposite of a taciturn doctor in Cornwall who graced our screens for ten series. Which is why I think he was perfect for this role. He shows up at this school where the most formative years of a young boys life will also be the cruelest and he is horrified by what he sees. And you can see it there, all on his face. He doesn't believe in corporeal punishment he believes in kindness. Soon he finds a woman who believes the same as him and they are married and she helps him to see that love is what these children need. He isn't able to get much traction on his desired reforms and soon he loses the love of his life in childbirth, but his students love him. Students who are going to die in droves in the first World War. Is this supposed to be happy? What is the message? Look what one man with a heart of gold can do and fuck war? Wait, were all these books written to self sooth to be a balm on the wounds of how horrible British public schools were and that war was actually better than being bullied at school? Because this starts out so uplifting and ends in tears. Mr. Chips changes hearts and minds and then the bodies housing those hearts and minds die in the trenches. I really can't believe how much death is in this. Why couldn't he and his wife have had a happy ending? Why did his only children have to be the students? I mean, it's too bittersweet for me. Yes, the war had so much death and given the time period I expected that this would encompass the first World War, I was just hoping, maybe, I don't know, something more upbeat and not bleak. Well, if I had stopped it halfway through that would have been the case. So I heartily approve of watching this nice fifty minute movie. There are not another fifty minutes. There are only fifty. That is all. His wife says she is expecting, cue the credits.
Disclaimer is a complex show about how we as individuals and as a society apportion blame and deal with our own trauma. With these weighty subjects it feels as if at times it's fighting with itself by using cheap gimmickry. The main stumbling block which you surprisingly do indeed get used to is the voiceovers. Kevin Kline and Cate Blanchett both narrate their inner thoughts in the first person. Which, can sometimes be annoying, sometimes enlightening, and sometimes humorous. The problem is the second person narration done by Indira Varma in, one can only assume, the worst echo chamber ever conceived for recording in the history of mankind. Indira acts as narrator for Cate Blanchett's character Catherine Ravenscroft at the beginning of the miniseries while she narrates for Kevin Kline's character Stephen Brigstocke at the end, and an inconsequential bit inbetween for Catherine's husband Robert played by Sacha Baron Cohen. The shift is when Catherine reclaims her voice and faces her trauma while Stephen retreats into himself after realizing his horrible misapprehension. So, kind of cliched, but if the sound hadn't been so bad it would have kind of worked. But this show is just a mess in all things auditory. Horrible music choices are clashing and drowning out dialogue. Everything is just cacophonous. And if it was done on purpose to be more "real" well, "real" here doesn't equal enjoyable. Yes, programing should challenge the viewers, but intellectually, not physically. Plus, the way the cats just roam free and do whatever they want is delightful and gives the show a realness without any pain. In fact, while Kevin Kline could easily get an Emmy for this, the three cats are the stars. I mean, why aren't these cats credited on IMDb!?! I need to know who they are, what their names are, and what other things they have starred in. And again, the cats ground it in reality unlike the nauseating handheld camera work whenever Catherine Ravenscroft's husband Robert is the focal point. We don't care about Robert. And we sure as hell don't want to see him if that janky camerawork is coming. The sound, the camera, the voiceovers, all these are just amateurish and then you watch Kevin Kline and he's so amazing you kind of forget the bad and focus on the good. He sets out to destroy Catherine Ravenscroft's life because he believes that she is the reason his son died in Italy twenty years previously. And the thing is, he's right, in the bigger picture, but he gets the details so wrong and while combating the trauma of losing his son and then his wife to Cancer he foists all the blame on Catherine. Whom he destroys. Utterly. And this destruction is a joy to behold. You WANT him to succeed. He plays a kind, doddering, old man to get close to Catherine's husband and son. He creates a finsta to push her son over the edge. And each shift starts subtle and blooms into that mischievous grin that hasn't changed in over forty years. Damn, I've missed Kevin Kline! But when he realizes that truth. When Cate Blanchett delivers the real truth bomb in the final episode, you see why she has two Oscars. They play and fight off against each other across a shitty kitchen table and it's the meeting of two acting geniuses. But I think Kevin Kline gets the last gutpunch in when he realizes the trauma his son inflicted on Catherine and he, in turn, spares her son. That hospital bedside scene should be studied as a masterwork. This series though? Is kind of a mixed bag of perfection and amateurism, much like life itself.
Babel by R.F. Kuang
The Dead Boy Detectives have had a rocky go of things. It seems like they are destined to forever be DOA. Ironic really. They premiered in The Sandman comic way back in 1991 in issue #25 and despite having read and reread "Season of Mists" quite a few times they were completely and utterly forgettable. Or at least that's how I felt. But I have issues with The Sandman. In the intervening ten years between their introduction and Ed Brubaker writing them a four issue miniseries which you just cannot find anywhere Charles Rowland and Edwin Payne picked up their raison d'etre with the moniker of "Dead Boy Detectives." Their first appearance on screen was in Doom Patrol in 2021 with Sebastian Croft and Ty Tennant, yes David Tennant's stepson Ty, playing the roles. Which resulted in Max wanting to do a spinoff that got stuck in developmental hell and when Netflix realized they might have a hit on their hands with The Sandman it seemed logical for them to scoop up Dead Boy Detectives. But not as Max had envisioned it. A whole new very peak CW version starring Jayden Revri and George Rexstrew with in-universe crossovers with The Sandman. Because two dead boys are kind of in the remit of Death... So yes, this show has Death! And when this show premiered on Netflix it got a loyal following almost instantly. It's like all of Neil Gaiman's shows put into a blender and coming out as a show that could air between Smallville and Veronica Mars. I mean Blake Neely even did the music and he did ALL the Arrowverse! Which, yes, I know, it's not peak CW, but at least it's CW. It was a cute show with overarching themes of acceptance and love while also sticking to a slight monster of the week format. The show consists of eight episodes and for me personally it didn't really click until episode three, "The Case of the Devlin House." Our leads get caught in a murderous time loop with "Owner of a Lonely Heart" proving that it's a song that doesn't get annoying no matter how many times you listen to it. This is when I finally connected to the characters. This is when I realized I could watch ten seasons of this show and never get bored. I should have remembered that Netflix hates their viewers and never wants them to be happy. Though personally, I don't blame this cancellation on them. But before I go into that I need to discuss Lukas Gage as the Cat King. Lukas Gage is having a moment. Within the last three years he has shown up in seven shows I've been watching. And been spectacular in all of them. Even when he's a complete a total asshole, he's such a spectacular one you have to applaud him. He was perfect as the Cat King. He WAS a cat! But more importantly, he was a wonderful sexy foil for Edwin. He helped Edwin come to accept himself while also being so damn sexy. I mean, I know we're not getting more of this show, but can I get a Cat King spinoff? And that's the sad truth, we're not getting ten seasons of this show. We're not getting more than the eight episodes we've gotten because of Neil Gaiman. And for those who claim, this isn't fair on the fans and he didn't have anything to do with this show... Um, first, he created the characters AND wrote all of Death's dialogue, but more importantly, he is an abuser and Netflix and his fans can't condone this by turning a blind eye so they can be entertained by a show. There are bigger things in life than television shows. So yeah. I'm sad that this show is more collateral damage from the truth of Neil Gaiman being revealed. But I don't know if I could go back and watch this show knowing what I know. Things have shifted. This dark yet hopeful world that Gaiman created in his works was a false reality that he used to lure his fans into his web. And that web needs to meet a blowtorch.
A Breath of Life by Clarice Lispector
Thrice the Brinded Cat Hath Mew'd by Alan Bradley
Wild Sign by Patricia Briggs
Mr Selfridge is a series that really came into it's own in the second series. If it had kept on the self-indulgent and self-destructive trajectory of the first series it wouldn't have lasted beyond it's second series, and I wouldn't have watched another episode. Did anybody really want to watch the hallucinatory post car crash episode? NO! Well, probably Jeremy Piven, but no one else. Instead we were lucky enough to have four series, three of which understood that while Selfridge, the man and the establishment, were the glue that held the series together, it was really the supporting cast that made the show work. It was the romance of Henri and Agnes, Miss Mardle finding purpose in her life besides being Mr. Grove's mistress, Arthur Crabb just being Arthur Crabb, the unexpected alliance of Frank and Kitty, the machinations of Lord Loxley, the delights of Lady Mae, I could go on and on because there was so much to love in this show. But what really made the show click for me in series two, besides the tonal shift, was that I knew Rose Selfridge was on the way out. Here's the thing. Everyone has an actor or actress they just can't stand. Watching them is like having your eyes being slowly clawed out of their sockets or having really painful dental surgery. Well, for me, Frances O'Connor and that Jack Nicholson Joker-esque smile of hers is at the top of my hate list. The hate started for me with the horrific 1999 adaptation of Mansfield Park, of which the less said the better. My feelings were really solidified by the movie A.I., and well, the rest is history, as in, I historically and forevermore will hate her, not matter what, and I thank the stars above every day that the adaptation of the Locke and Key series wasn't picked up with her as Nina. Anyway, after the first series when the show was picked up for a second series I read a bit about Harry Gordon Selfridge and saw that his beloved wife Rose, played by Frances O'Connor, died in the pandemic of 1918. Not good news for the real Rose, great news for me! All I had to do was get through her scenes in series two, which were minimized because of expanding the plotlines to include the supporting characters, and I'd be home free. Series three starts with a very welcome funeral. Sometimes the tragedies of life can make me happy. 
Dark Triumph by Robin LaFevers
Need not want. That's the way of the witch. You are respected and well regarded, but not really liked. Who indeed would like the person who knows all your dirty little secrets and does what needs to be done? There is also a certain amount of fear underneath, because though a witch's job has little to do with magic, there's always the threat of it. Worn to the bone by the needs of the people of the Chalk Tiffany doesn't have time for sleep, especially when the rough music starts. Mr. Petty has been singled out by the villagers, an abusive man; he has taken things too far this time with his daughter Amber. While Tiffany doesn't necessary support or condemn the villagers and their plan to oust Mr. Petty, she knows one thing, evil though he may be, Mr. Petty doesn't deserve to die. After dealing with Mr. Petty and having another sleepless night, Tiffany is called to the home of the Baron. Once everyone thought that one day she would be the mistress of the manner when Roland inherited. But being the two "different" people didn't mean they were the two "right" people for each other and Roland is deep in preparations for his wedding to Letitia while his father slips away. When Roland goes away to the great city of Ankh Morpork, his father, the Baron, finally dies peacefully.
One day in the spring of 2007 I stumbled on a book at Barnes and Noble by an author who would quickly become one of my most favorite authors ever. Theodosia and the Serpents of Chaos by Robin (R.L.) LaFevers was, as some of my friends put it, the book I would write if I wrote, full of cats and mummies, and oh so British to boot. As the years went by I wouldn't just wait for Robin's new books, oh no, I would hunt them out, track down ways to gets advanced reader copies, sometimes even from her, any way to get her newest tome into my hands. There's a reason I started a blog, and that was to have a legitimate excuse to harass publishers and authors for ARCs! When she transitioned to YA in 2012 with the His Fair Assassin series I was one of the first to proclaim that she had reached a whole new level in her mastery of storytelling.
High-Rise by J.G. Ballard
