Season 42 - The Mystery of Edwin Drood (2012)
For years I put off watching The Mystery of Edwin Drood because I wanted to read the unfinished manuscript by Dickens in order to read Dan Simmons's Drood. Then when this movie came out, because even if they call it a miniseries, only two hour-long episodes only equals a movie, I still hadn't gotten around to my previous goals so I thought I'd wait. Well, seeing as it's now way over a decade later and I still haven't gotten around to reading, well, either of the aforementioned books, I figured it was time to watch this adaptation. Plus, I was going through severe Freddie Fox withdrawal. Who would have thought I'd ever like anyone other than Tom Hiddleston playing Loki!?! And now that Freddie's really the only socially acceptable male Fox, how could I not give into the craving? Which sadly this didn't quite assuage. In fact, if you really need a Freddie Fox fix Year of the Rabbit episode three, "Gangs," is perfection. There is of course the first few seasons of Slow Horses, but, things don't end up so well for him there.... Back to Dickens! There are many problems with this "miniseries," the most glaring of which is how forgettable it is. I just watched this and I am struggling to recall anything that happened. The problem was this should have been minimally a three-part adaptation. It's just too short to get the full panoply of Dickensian characters. This is exacerbated by the fact that the entire first episode is basically Matthew Rhys in a drugged fug, making anything happening too hard to comprehend even for Hunter S. Thompson. Which, if they had stretched this to three episodes would have been mitigated. Because the angry dissociation of the first episode would have been just part of our tale not half of it. Well, more than half of it because it's not like John Jasper is giving up the drugs anytime soon. And yes, I think if Dickens had survived Wilkie Collins would have possibly had a valid case for libel. But the saving grace of this series is David Dawson as Bazzard. David Dawson who just happens to play Joseph Merrick, "The Elephant Man," in the aforementioned episode of Year of the Rabbit, "Gangs." Seriously, go watch that episode. It might be one of the funniest things you'll ever watch in your entire life. While here David Dawson brings the Dickensian vibe this series was so sorely missing in its first half. He is the clerk to Edwin Drood's fiance's guardian. And given this is Dickens, that's actually a concise relationship. Usually they are all convoluted and full of secrecy. He basically gets stuck into all the mysteries and secrets and just solves everything. I'm sad that he couldn't solve the problem of this show, but there's only so much one character can do. Especially if he's given only one episode to do it in.
The British do love their holiday ghost stories, so it only makes sense that they took that tradition to the television. Starting in 1971 they started adapting ghost stories written by M.R. James for the holiday season starring acting luminaries such as Robert Hardy, Clive Swift, Peter Vaughan, Barbara Ewing, Lalla Ward, Denholm Elliott, and Peter Bowles. They even adapted a Charles Dickens tale before foolheartedly deciding to create their own original content. Two abysmal stories, "Stigma" and "The Ice House," seemed to put the nail in the coffin of this series. But it was so beloved, with fans clamoring for remastered releases and Blu-ray sets, that that wasn't the end. The show returned in 2005 going back to it's origins by adapting an M.R. James story, "A View from a Hill." Once again they brought in the top names in acting, starting with Pip Torrens, Greg Wise, John Hurt, and many others. After his adaptation of 'The Tractate Middoth" in 2013 Mark Gatiss took over the show delivering it once again on a yearly schedule starting with an original episode in 2018. Thankfully Simon Callow was able to make "The Dead Room" work whereas Peter Bowles had let "Stigma" flounder. But I think that wasn't just down to acting, I really do think it was the material. And Mark Gatiss, bless his heart, just somehow is able to embody a bygone era whereas the writers in the seventies had other ideas. Bad ideas. Incestous flora ideas. And seriously, what was with the blood just oozing out of that poor lady's pores? Aside from that one original episode all the episodes in what we shall call the revival for lack of a better word have been adapted from the work of M.R. James. Except for this past year's. This past year's was adapted from "Lot No. 249" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. This episode has it all, Kit Harington being a stuffy and incredulous nonbeliever of the supernatural, Freddie Fox being a fey and dangerous man who with longer hair unnervingly looks like his sister, and a man who may or may not be Sherlock Holmes played by John Heffernan, a man who should have definitely said no to that horrid Dracula adaptation by Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat, and in the coup de grace, a mummy who will deliver your coup de grace. This episode might just be my favorite among the revival episodes. Well, I do love a good haunting by mummy, and Conan Doyle, like the episode adapted from Dickens, seems to work a little better than the stories by M.R. James. I'm not saying there aren't genius episodes adapted from his work, they're just a little more nebulous, a little more open ended. Sometimes, even when dealing with the supernatural, you want a definitive ending, but if you're M.R. James how about some creepy kids wandering off eerily playing the hurdy-gurdy? You think I jest? Just watch "Lost Hearts" and I'll be over here laughing while you're unable to sleep. Sadly it looks like this tradition might be coming to an end due to budgetary concerns. While I only caught the revival episodes the last two years and was finally able to see the original run this year I think this fate is a shame. It's a tradition that survived whatever "The Ice House" was and I want it to continue for many many years to come. It's not like we're going to run out of material now is it? There's always a ghost story to tell for Christmas.
