New New Doctor Who season two: the parting of the ways?

Nowadays, I sometimes watch an old Doctor Who episode not just because I feel like it, but to remind me that Doctor Who actually was good during the first Davies era and the Steven Moffat era. I wasn't imagining it, and so back in December 2022, when I was so excited about the return of Russell T Davies (aka RTD), I had no way of knowing how hard his second stint as showrunner would crash and burn.

True, I was apprehensive about his politics, though not apprehensive enough as it turns out. The problem with Davies's second run – the "RTD 2" run – is that not only is the political commentary dialled up to eleven and clumsier than ever (and it wasn't exactly subtle in the olden days), but the things he did well are less in evidence, if at all. 

Where are the grounded characters and everyday situations that you believed in? I barely feel I know the new companions Ruby Sunday and Belinda Chandra at all. Ruby's adoptive mother Carla and grandmother Cherry had some promise, but they weren't given enough screen time to develop (and it was a shame that Carla ended up betraying Ruby in two aborted time lines over two seasons). All the UNIT staff seemed to be given about one or two character traits each. You can't blame the Who Culture youtubers for nicknaming Colonel Ibrahim "Colonel Sexy", because what else is he? I'm starting to wonder whether I like Kate Stewart simply because Jemma Redgrave is such a great actress, as I still don't quite know what the character is about after all these years. And what is Rose Noble (who ought to be in school) doing at the UNIT headquarters at all? Not even Davies himself seems to know. 

As for Belinda's family, I kept thinking there was a plot twist coming where it would turn out she actually didn't have any parents, in spite of her talking about them all the time, because we didn't get to meet them. Belinda's mother eventually makes a brief appearance, but her father is kept off-screen. What's with all the missing fathers? Davies, who once opened up Doctor Who to romantic girl-meets-Doctor storylines, seems to have acquired a new distaste for heterosexual mating and its manifestations.

While we're on the subject of characterisation, what happened to the characters being interestingly flawed even when they happen to tick some minority box? Ruth Madeley was allowed to play a complex character in Years and Years – the cheeky little sister whose judgment wasn't always sound (she voted for the dangerous populist Vivienne Rook). Her Shirley Bingham, on the other hand, is little more than a token disabled character, seemingly flawless.

What happened to bringing back characters from Classic Who in a meaningful and thrilling manner, instead of hauling them in and then completely wasting their potential? Who can forget the Dalek-Cyberman face-off ("this is not war, this is pest control"), the Master's return and the confrontation between the Doctor and Davros in RTD's first era? And now what do we get? Not one but two excellent actresses taking on the Rani, but given precious little to work with. The Rani is dispatched unceremoniously and without any real effort on the Doctor's part about midway through the final episode. Still, she is lucky compared to the other Classic Who villain Omega, resurrected as a soulless CGI monster then got rid of within minutes. I haven't even seen any Omega adventures, and I still felt offended. And what happened to the Doctor's granddaughter Susan, of whom we saw the merest glimpse but who then didn't appear in the finale at all? 

To get to the point, season two of the RTD 2 era had so many flaws they even became apparent to viewers who have no problem with the politics, which is still very much in evidence, as it was in season one. What particularly cheesed me off about the commentary this time around was that its particular target was white young men with a taste for gaming or social media – in other words, we got a look at what Davies imagines New New Who's angriest critics are like. 

Both Belinda's controlling ex-boyfriend Alan and the duplicitous podcaster Conrad were poorly understood caricatures. I should have enjoyed the episode "Wish World" as it contained a fake reality, a trope I'm usually a sucker for. But the moral arrogance behind the depiction of Conrad's Wish World as everything the seemingly progressive Davies despises was hard to watch. Of course a monster such as Conrad must be in favour of women staying in the home, against homosexuality and ignorant even of the existence of the disabled and "dispossessed". Unlike, one imagines, Davies, who is all for rainbows and puppies and world peace.

To be fair, the finale did take a step back when it came to the Conrad hate (I seem to be the only one who appreciated that Ruby showed him mercy instead of tearing into him). But that is about all that can be said for it. Ncuti Gatwa regenerating into Billie Piper (who played companion Rose Tyler in RTD's first era) was a tired stunt that had even me groaning, and I have a high tolerance for fan service. But to tell the truth, I was fed up long before then. I'm not sure what to do about Doctor Who in the future. I can't seriously be prepared to stop watching it, can I?

What do you mean, "don't take Eurovision too seriously"?

The Ascension Day holiday, usually a good time for blogging, will be a little busier than usual this year, so I'd better get my Eurovision post out of the way this week instead. The first question that suggests itself is: Am I upset that Sweden didn't win? Answer: Nope. Not even the littlest bit.

Now, don't get me wrong. The Finnish trio KAJ who represented Sweden this year are charming boys. Their number, which poked gentle fun at Swedish conceptions of Finns, has done wonders for relations between Sweden and Finland, and is very easy to hum. But it is a jokey song, designed to appeal to those who prefer Eurovision to be as wacky as possible. And I'm not one of them.

My daily newspaper was fond of proclaiming that it was about time Sweden sent something a little more light-hearted to the contest. According to Swedish journalists, Sweden had started to become unpopular by sending high-quality, earnest pop songs to Eurovision year after year, as if we cared about winning way too much. We needed to learn how to chill a bit more and not take the whole thing so seriously.

It's a point of view, I guess, but it's not mine. There's no denying Eurovision tends to be full of "out there" moments, and there are probably lots of fans who lean into the crazy and think that that's what it's all about. But for me, the Eurovision Song Contest is primarily just that – a song contest. You don't have to win it, certainly (though it's preferable to make the final, and not finish last among the finalists). But you should aim to send a good, solid song to represent your country. Jokes should be left to the host country's self-deprecating intermission number.

I mean, can you see the Norwegians sending skiers who clown about in the snow to the Ski World Championships, just to make everyone feel better because Norway usually tends to win? No, me neither, worse luck.

Basel did a stellar job of hosting this year, with hosts that actually had a matey chemistry and good timing in their delivery of a not-too-cringey script. As for the songs, here are some of the memorable moments:

Positive national stereotype of the year: Spain Maybe not the strongest on rewatch, but I had a weakness for the Flamenco (or something)-dancing Spanish diva, who ended her number reclining in a swoony pose in the capable arms of a brave background dancer (imagine if he'd dropped her). Spectacle, glamour, and pretty nice to listen to.

Aww-inducing act of the year: Italy "I don't have the face of a tough guy" – no, that you don't, sweetheart. These last years, Italy has shown a certain amount of street cred, and this year's entry, though not as rocky as, say, Måneskin, continued the trend. Lucio's clown makeup did make me feel as if a character from an old Swedish children's programme was having an existential crisis (to Swedish readers I need only say: banana), but the overall effect was that of a cute troubadour acquitting himself with credit.

Shameless filth of the year: Finland and Malta You're in trouble when a Finnish blonde riding an enormous microphone up to the sky while yelling "Ich komme" ("I come", in German for some reason, I mean ta very much but even so) isn't even the most tasteless thing Eurovision has to offer. Instead, that prize goes to Malta. Can you blame the EBU for demanding that the word "kant" (Maltese for "song", apparently) be removed from the song title? The number still leaves little to the imagination, with the singer entering through an open, heavily-lipsticked mouth, widely-spread female legs waving in the background, and dancers cavorting in the foreground. By the end, the singer is seated on a bouncing ball. I'd say it's pretty clear it's not song she's serving. But what are the gently rocking leopards doing there?

Nice singers, shame about the song of the year: United Kingdom It may seem I'm always picking on the poor old UK, but honestly, limeys, it's just because I love you and want you to do better. This time, we had three female pros from musical theatre. That's a good start – but what were they singing? Every time you thought the song was about to go somewhere, it inexplicably slowed down in a stop-go-stop-go manner. Not sophisticated, just weird.

Earworm of the year: Luxemburg Oh dear, are we still doing the "I'm not a puppet" cliché? Still, it has to be said, the refrain sticks in your brain very effectively.

I'm still avoiding those elephants, as you can see. Sorry about that.

The guilty pleasure of Riverdale

Imagine, if you can, a TV series called Duckburg, where the characters are not quite as you remember them from Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse comics. To start with, naturally, they're all human. Flintheart Glomgold is married to Magica de Spell, and the murder of their son Gladstone Gander forms the main mystery to be resolved during the show's first season. Mickey Mouse has made clear to Minnie in the very first episode that he's only interested in her as a friend. That's just as well, as Minnie starts a sweet romance with an unusually broody Goofy, who has plans of becoming a writer but is somewhat too mixed up in a biker gang. Mickey, for his part, is dating the daughter of Peg-Leg Pete – who incidentally has hit the gym big time.

This, you would agree, would be taking a great deal of liberties with the source material. But heck, I'd watch it.

Without actually having read the American comic Archie (except stray pages that the cunning algorithm has started to show in my Facebook feed), I'd say this is a pretty fair analogy to the difference between Archie and the TV series Riverdale. The comic, from what I have been told and can make out from said Facebook snippets, is a light-hearted affair where girl-next-door Betty and rich girl Veronica vie for the attention of the red-headed titular character. In the TV series, on the other hand, the young protagonists' lives and loves are endlessly complicated by dark and twisted mysteries, and the outwardly idyllic small town is full of buried corpses (literally). It's borderland insane – but I am hooked.

So why, considering that the quality does go downhill after a neat first season, and the plot lines get ever more derailed, did I spend the better part of a day (I had and have a cold, so there was an excuse) bingeing the last episodes of season four of Riverdale instead of, say, finally watching The Conclave? My reasons are highly subjective:

It's Once Upon A Time methadone: Small-town intrigue? Check. Cosy diner where everyone goes? Check. Twisted goings-on behind an idyllic front? Check. Powerful mayors and sheriffs who wear an actual star on their police uniform? Check. Lots and lots of relationship drama? Check. Riverdale gives me enough "heightened reality" – or rather total lack of reality – vibes to remind me of my all-time favourite series. 

True, there's no Rumple/Mr Gold for my heart to ache over, but that can be restful. And the villains on offer are entertaining, in their fashion. In the first season, the Blossom family, with their 19th-century Gothic Aesthetic, are an absolute delight, but their importance diminishes as the series goes on. The exception is red-headed bombshell Cheryl, who moves from bitch to wild-card to generally well-disposed towards the heroes. She's always fun with her withering put-downs and quirks, but what can I say? I had hoped that the Blossom family drama would have turned out somewhat differently.

What of Peg-Leg Pete then – or rather Hiram Lodge, father of the enterprising Veronica Lodge? I mean, he's handsome – conventionally so, but they can't all be silver foxes. However, much as my superego appreciates that the series doesn't go the clichéd route of turning a "normal" businessman into a villainous mastermind, and instead opts for making Hiram a straight-out gangster, my id is a bit disappointed. As tired as the Evil Capitalist trope is, it usually leads to more toothsome villains (in my personal opinion) than the Tough Mobster trope. Hiram's fun, with his wide-eyed "what did I do?" reaction to well-founded accusations, but he's a bit too macho for me.

I can catch up on the soap-watching experience: I was too young for the classic soaps such as Dallas and Dynasty, and though there were soaps aimed at teenagers around when I myself was one, I wasn't patient enough back then to try them. Any series with more than 100 episodes I wrote off immediately. 

Now, though, I see the appeal of series where you're not going to run out of episodes in a hurry. There's a particular appeal in watching the script writers come up with increasingly far-fetched drama just to keep the story going. Yes, it will lead to arcs you don't care for very much and want wrapped up as soon as possible, but if the writers do their job properly there will be enough plates spinning to keep you interested even through the rough patches. And there's always the hope that they'll hit gold and suddenly introduce a storyline almost as good as in that first season you fondly remember.

The protagonists are really likeable: At the centre of the series are four friends (who are supposed to be high-schoolers but naturally are played by actors in their twenties). They eventually pair up into two couples: Archie and Veronica on the one hand, Betty and Jughead (real name: Forsythe Pendleton III, and no, he's not "old money") on the other. Of course there are plenty of bust-ups, but essentially they stand by each other through thick and thin and are a bunch easy to root for. 

Betty is the stand-out – a good girl with a dark side, who generally manages to keep "Dark Betty" under control and do the right thing, while being well able to counter any bitchy attack with full force. Jughead has his own scruffy charm, and Veronica is an entertaining powerhouse, always dragging the somewhat aimless Archie in her wake with gentle force. 

Archie himself is, in some ways, the weak link, saddled as he is with a certain righteous blandness. His character is also one of the main victims of the soap format: every half-season or so, he's seriously into something new, something he's convinced will be the mainstay of his future: music, boxing, helping disadvantaged youths, you name it. You just want him to pick a lane and stop making hair-raising mistakes. On the other hand, having a hero character in need of support from his more colourful friends isn't such a bad idea. And let's face it: the hero was never going to be the main attraction for me.

Sorry, ladies, Heathcliff is still the worst

I've done it: after far too many years, decades even, I've reread Wuthering Heights, and I found it a surprisingly riveting read. Although my memory served me right when it came to the characters – many of them are awful, and even the more likeable ones have irritating traits it's sometimes hard to forgive – the book proved to be such a ripping yarn I didn't mind it as much as I did in my teens. As they say, there's a lot to unpack here, so I'll limit myself. My defence of Nelly Dean will have to keep, as will my slightly Harry-Potterish theory that Joseph the near-unintelligible servant is some sort of house gnome.

My greatest surprises when revisiting Wuthering Heights were firstly its sheer readability, and secondly how young most of the protagonists are. Much of the characters' over-excitability and bad decisions could at least partly be down to youthful folly. At the book's first crisis, when Heathcliff runs away after hearing Catherine reject him (but not staying around to hear her love declaration, such as it is) and she falls ill, she is only fifteen and he about a year older. When Heathcliff returns, he is barely out of his teens and Catherine nineteen at most. 

The other main characters are also youngsters. Edgar Linton's the same age as his rival, Isabella Linton is only eighteen when she develops her crush on Heathcliff, and even Hindley – who's eight years older than his sister Catherine – is only twenty-three when he loses his beloved wife, and dies before he's hit thirty. In the second part of the novel, there's a whole new set of teenagers and a twentysomething acting foolishly. Much of the high drama in the novel becomes more understandable in the context of teenage angst and self-absorption, though it certainly doesn't explain all of the odd behaviour. 

Even Lockwood, the novel's framing-device narrator (before he leaves the story to Nelly), is an example of callow youth. He's exiled himself to the moors after having rejected a girl he pined for when she showed signs of returning his interest: a typical young man's mistake. Stunted emotional growth and immaturity is something of a theme in the book.

But enough of that. The real question is: do I, villain-lover that I am, still dislike Heathcliff as much as I did when I was younger? The answer is: well, yeah!

To be fair, though, I can more easily see his interest to certain female readers than I could before. He does have some features that usually make for a good villain: he's intelligent, handsome and perfectly miserable. I was sorry for him in the later part of the book, when his loneliness becomes so acute that even Lockwood's company is a relief to him. Also, as I'm someone who enjoys her creature comforts, the scenes where Heathcliff can't bring himself to eat while haunted by Catherine, even when the food's right in front of him, hit me quite hard. So I guess I have to accord the man some leader of the pack appeal. But apart from that – ugh.

I guess how you respond to Heathcliff partly comes down to whether you think he has a case to start with, and I don't. I've always been Team Hindley. Now, don't get me wrong. I know Hindley's a pretty useless character, what with his drinking, knocking people about and gambling (mostly as a plot contrivance, but still). I'm less inclined to forgive Hindley for neglecting his son out of grief for his wife than when I was younger and more romantic, and he would have gone to pot even without Heathcliff's help. His downfall reminded me of Gerald Fairley's in A Woman of Substance, of all things ("That was my plan, but you did it yourself, really"). 

Nevertheless, Hindley was Mr Earnshaw's son, and Mr Earnshaw's money and land were rightfully his. There was zero reason for him to keep spoiling his father's pet, who lorded it over him while in favour, when Mr Earnshaw died. If Earnshaw wanted Heathcliff to be a gentleman so badly, he should have made provisions for him, and Heathcliff should have had the wits to keep the peace with his future master. Besides, I'm certain the little blighter broke that fiddle.

Even if Heathcliff had had a case, though, I must say his defenders are able to swallow a great deal. He's a bully and a sadist. His psychological torture of Isabella, young Cathy (his great love's daughter), his own son Linton and others inspires cruelty in them in turn. Isabella retaliates against Heathcliff; Cathy also lands some psychological blows on Heathcliff but also torments poor Hareton (Hindley's son); Linton is encouraged to torment Cathy and everyone is free to have a go at Linton, including Joseph. Though personally I found the psychological sadism the hardest to take, there's a lot of brute force applied as well.

And then, there's the tiresome speechifying on Heathcliff's part, mostly phrased as confidences to Nelly (a rare touching trait in both Heathcliff and the ghastly Catherine the elder is how they both keep confiding in Nelly long after she's lost any sympathy for them). Some of it is self-congratulatory moustache-twirling; some of it teeth-gnashing fee-fi-fo-fum-ing (I'll think you'll find there's no country anywhere where you're allowed to perform vivisection on your son and future daughter-in-law, mate); some of it simply disturbing rambling (those plans respecting Heathcliff's corpse and Catherine's – yikes). In many ways, though he becomes more Machiavellian as he grows older, Heathcliff stays a vengeful and obsessive teenager emotionally until the end, or close to the end at any rate. As Pepe le Pew would say, "Eet ees de leetle boy in him".

If Heathcliff is your cup of tea, then fine, but admit this much at any rate: he's not a hero, or a tragic hero, or an anti-hero. He's a villain. And I guess some like their villains rough.

A very English (somewhat chilly) mini-series

Finally, I've followed the strong recommendations of friends and critics and watched the mini-series A Very English Scandal from 2018, which, as luck would have it, was still available on Swedish streaming. The title's not a lie: it's certainly very English indeed. Given this and my anglophile tendencies, one would maybe have expected me to warm to it more, but perhaps it's just not meant to be the kind of story you warm to. In any case, I did enjoy it.

The odds are stacked in the show's favour. It stars Hugh Grant, Ben Whishaw, Alex Jennings and a great supporting cast; it's directed by Stephen Frears; it's based on a book by John Preston (if it's the same John Preston I'm thinking of, I used to like his reviews in The Sunday Telegraph a lot); and, last but not least, it's written by Russell T Davies, back when he was still good. All right, maybe that's unfair, but I'm still bitter about what he's serving up in Doctor Who these days. In the best scenes in Scandal, you wonder how it can be the same man who wrote this and drivel like the "male-presenting Time Lord" speech in "The Star Beast" or the clumsy eat-the-rich-kids satire in "Dot and Bubble".

The scandal in question is one I know nothing about, which can be both an advantage and a bit dangerous. It concerns Jeremy Thorpe, leader of the Liberal Party in England in the Sixties and Seventies, who was doing really well until people found out, one: that he had a male ex-lover and two: that he tried to have said male ex-lover killed.

At least, that was what Thorpe was accused of. From the point of view of the TV series, there's never any doubt that he was as guilty as a man can be. This is where the danger of not knowing anything comes in, because I buy it all, even while wondering how a seemingly canny politician could have been so stupid. Although the characterisation is far from black and white, you do briefly wonder about the ethical aspects of making a juicy TV drama of something that happened not so long ago (Jeremy Thorpe's son is probably still alive). But heck, it is a good story.

In spite of its sharp script and good pace, underscored by lively music from the excellent Murray Gold (more British talent), I wasn't completely blown away by the first episode. It was hard to care too much about an affair gone sour when the persons involved were Grant's callous Thorpe and Whishaw's neurotic Norman Josiffe, later Scott, who as soon as he was ditched reported Thorpe to the cops and wrote a 17-page-long letter to his (Thorpe's) mother. But the show got steadily better – or rather, more engaging, as it was always good. By the third episode, I was at the edge of my seat, and here it is a definite advantage not to know how it all turned out. The last sentence of the "what happened then" summaries at the end hits the at once droll and moving note it aims for.

If anyone is short-changed in this drama, it's Jeremy Thorpe. Not that Hugh Grant doesn't do an excellent job of playing him, but the man remains an enigma until the end. Grant can do both charm and the lurking darkness beneath to perfection, but what he's been less called for to do during his career is vulnerability or raw emotion, and this part is no exception. This version of Thorpe is no tragic hero, someone who could have done great things if he hadn't stumbled down a dark path following one misstep. He is a man with a sliver of ice in his heart acting in character. It's not a complete hatchet-job, which makes it all the more damaging. Thorpe clearly cared about his family, and every clip we see of a political speech (there's not that many, though) makes quite a lot of sense. Also, Norman's no saint, and you can understand why his ex feels sorely tried at times. Still, you're left thinking that England had a lucky escape.      

Davies keeps his own hobby-horses admirably at bay. There's the odd line that sounds more like him than the characters, as when Norman complains about "men like him" not being in the history books (but what do I know? That could be direct quote). It's also a bit remarkable that just about every male character seems to have at least tried on sleeping with men, and bisexuality isn't really considered as a plausible explanation to playing both sides, unless the fellow concerned would otherwise be labelled heterosexual. But we're spared ranting, and Davies even uses his own experiences (or what feels like his own experiences) to touching effect. Not that he was around the gay scene, or lack of it, at the same time as Jeremy Thorpe, but he can clearly relate to it's being a jungle out there.

I'm glad I got round to watching A Very English Scandal. Like one of its protagonists, it can be a bit chilly at times. However, if RTD hits his stride again and produces anything nearly as good in the upcoming season of Doctor Who, I will be a very happy bunny.

Captain America: Brave New World: Inoffensive popcorn fare

I wasn't sure I'd have enough to say about Captain America: Brave New World to be able to blog about it, but I'll give it a try. For one, it was the first Marvel movie I actually watched at the cinema instead of on TV, and it was worth it. Not just for the big screen experience, but for the nerdy content it unlocks on YouTube – I could watch videos not only about the film itself but about predictions for the MCU's future without getting anything spoiled. I've made a deal with my bladder, though: I will watch MCU movies in the cinema in future, but I'll not stick around for the post-credit scenes if my need is too great. This time, there was no problem (although the post-credit scene was underwhelming).

How was the film itself, then? Well... it's by no means an MCU highlight. I thought the script was weak: the banter between Sam Wilson, the newish Captain America, his new young sidekick Joaquin Torres and the grizzled veteran Isaiah Bradley was leaden; the story was uncompelling at times; and then there were lines like "Any word from Betty, my daughter?". Harrison Ford committed himself to the role of newly-elected President Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross, but neither he nor anyone else was given a lot to work with. Tim Blake Nelson struggled as the main villain (unlike many others, I didn't hate the augmented-brain design), but he had too much motive and too little menace. He might have worked better as a creepy nerd villain rather than an intimidating mastermind.

In spite of all this, not gonna lie, I had a good time. Maybe I was helped by my low expectations. I was not a fan of Falcon and the Winter Soldier with its preachiness, its dwelling on Sam's unnecessary hang-ups and its leniency towards the ghastly terror teen Karli Morgenthau. With the same people involved in the film, I had some fears that were not alleviated by trailer clips like Ross thundering to Sam: "You're not Steve Rogers" and Sam replying cockily "You're right, Sir, I'm not". Yeah, no reason to sound so pleased about that, Sam.

I may have missed it, but I think Sam's cocky reply was cut from the actual film. If I'm not dreaming this, it's significant for the film as a whole. It has the feel of a film that may have been preachy once, but where all the potentially preachy bits have been cut out. If this is a result of the supposedly extensive re-shoots, I can only applaud it. Sam himself is a sweetie, and his compassion and ability to see the best in people make him a good pick for Steve's successor. Much as I love Bucky, Steve made the right call: Captain America needs to be someone not quite as morally flexible as the former Winter Soldier.

The action parts of the film were thrilling enough, though sometimes giggle-inducingly over-the-top (and that's better than being boring). There are standout performances from Ford and from Carl Lumbly as Isaiah. I didn't care for Isaiah's storyline in Falcon and the Winter Soldier where he had to be a symbol of The Victims of America's Past Wrongdoings; however, as simply an old man who has spent decades wrongfully imprisoned and is terrified of going back to jail, he is very moving. All in all, Captain America: Brave New World is a good-enough popcorn flick, worth seeing once, which manages to be just a little bit heartwarming, too.

It raises one question, though: can a film perhaps be too inoffensive, especially when it's labelled a "political thriller"? Just as it's trying really hard not to be too preachy, it's trying just as hard not to have any bearing on real-life politics at all. "Thunderbolt" Ross may be an oldie, and he may turn into a rage monster towards the end, but there are no obvious resemblances between him and any recent American presidents. His main goal is to broker a treaty with Japan which will give them equal access to an extremely valuable mineral. I mean, if only. 

The truncated role of Ross's Chief of Security Ruth Bat-Seraph is another example of the film taking no risks. Her links to Mossad from the comics have been cut, and now she's simply a former Black Widow, which makes no sense seeing how unwilling she is to believe in the villain's mind control (which was exactly what happened to the Black Widows). Making Ruth comic-accurate would have been offensive to some; cutting her out completely after announcing her presence in the film would have been offensive to others; and so she's stuck in the middle as a character with very little significance to the plot.

For me, it's a question of being careful what I wish for. For years, I have been complaining about heavy-handed politics making its way into popular entertainment, and I stand by that. Even when I agree with the views expressed in various films or TV shows (it does happen), they're hammered home in such an annoying way that I start to feel some sympathy for the opposing point of view. By and large, I do prefer Captain America: Brave New World-style tiptoeing to rolling my eyes over ill-expressed political grandstanding. But the price of inoffensiveness may, in some cases, be a little blandness.

So the upper-class cad is the hero? OK, then

I'm in an intense escapism period book-wise, which explains why there will be a lot of TV and film posts in a row. I've already milked authors like Stephanie Garber and Emily Henry for their blog worth, and don't have that much to add, except a strong recommendation to read them if you want to retreat to a happy book place (and like the genres they're writing in – that's pretty crucial). To find the same kind of escapism on TV, however, is proving surprisingly hard.

All right, that's a forced transition, as I watched the British drama/soap Rivals on Disney Plus last year and not just now. Nevertheless, it is the kind of series you are supposed to watch in an escapist mood. It's based on one of the "bonkbusters" penned by Dame Jilly Cooper, who seems beguilingly jolly. That the fictional county her stories take place in is called "Rutshire" says a lot. What's more, the series appears to be faithful to the spirit of the author: both the setting and the characters' outlook have a near-authentic Eighties feel. This should be right up my alley. But it isn't, quite.

To be honest, I thought it dragged a bit. At the same time, it is well-acted, and every time I was close to giving up a new plot development happened that had me thinking "OK, I want to see how this plays out". But I did spend lot of time wondering why I didn't get more into the series. Now, afterwards, I also wonder: if this show wasn't for me, then who is it for?

Quite a lot of people, it turns out. Rivals is a hit, and I've heard people I'd have thought would have minded the overall positive way upper-class stud Rupert Campbell-Black is depicted (I'll come back to that) praising its watchability. So what is holding me back from joining more wholeheartedly in the fun?

Could it be my bourgeois outlook? It's a strong possibility. I assumed, at the start of the series, that Campbell-Black would be seen as a bad guy, albeit possibly a redeemable one. I actually started Riders by Jilly Cooper once but didn't persevere, and in that novel, I got the impression that Campbell-Black was the villain (though the author clearly shared his pro-hunting stance). In Rivals, though, it didn't take long to figure out that in the rivalry between Campbell-Black and local media mogul Lord Baddingham, we are supposed to side with the former.

Now, I can find it endearing when the English gentry catches a break in the world of TV entertainment. It doesn't happen that often – caricatures of British poshos abound in dramas like Midsomer Murders, Morse and its spinoffs, and many, many others. When Downton Abbey dared to portray the Crawleys as decent people (on the whole), critics sneered. So in a way, I admire Dame Jilly for standing up for the toffs and not giving a whistle for street cred. At the same time, I am solidly middle-class myself, and if there's a fight between a nob and an upstart, I want to be able to side with the upstart.

That's hardly possible here, though, as Baddingham (the upstart in this scenario) is a thoroughly bad lot, and not in an alluring way. It's amazing the way David Tennant can turn off his considerable charm like a tap as Baddingham. There's a brief flash of Doctorish charisma as he's trying to persuade his mistress to go to Spain with him, and an equally brief flicker of vulnerability when he confronts said mistress with a particularly heinous betrayal. But otherwise, Tennant as Baddingham is in continuous creep mode.

So is the series snobbish, then? Well, it tries not to be. It does its best to give us truculent middle-classers reasons to dislike Baddingham that have nothing to do with his modest beginnings. Look how careless he is with his employees. Look at his brusqueness and his prejudices. Look how he puts professionalism aside for petty vengeance. Above all, look how little he appreciates his loyal and supportive wife.  Also, Baddingham finds himself at odds with the hard-hitting left-leaning journalist Declan O'Hara and the successful but teddy-bearish businessman Freddie Jones – just in case we were starting to suspect that his lack of poshness is an issue.

I know I shouldn't be too sniffy about obvious manipulativeness from a show like this, but I can't help finding it a bit tiresome. Another example is how the audience is bludgeoned into hoping Freddie and romance writer Lizzie Vereker (both married) will finally get it off. Lizzie's husband James is the most parodically one-dimensional bad hubby you can imagine. He ignores her. He puts her down. He cheats on her, flagrantly. He straight up recoils when she wants to rekindle their relationship. "Why don't you just divorce the wanker?" Campbell-Black asks, and that is certainly the question.

While I didn't find Rivals to be quite the fizzing champagne bottle of a show I'd hoped, many others did, so it's worth trying out for a good time (be warned, though: there's a jarringly serious rape story right in the middle). Also, I'll be checking out a possible season two, hoping to finally get a handle on Baddingham's mistress Cameron Cook whose motives are a mystery to me – which is welcome in a story where not many things remain mysterious. But Rupert Campbell-Black? Not my type.

Bewildered thoughts on The Diplomat season two

The Netflix series The Diplomat should make for a good blog subject when you are recovering from a cold. Because it is, in many respects, like a fever dream.

My greatest difficulty will be to pinpoint my biggest questions about the series. I think I'll settle for two: did the different writers of the series even know what the others were planning to put in it plot-wise? And what kind of show is The Diplomat even trying to be? I have a third big question which is more personal – Why am I more OK with the bizarre plot twist introduced at the end of season two than the bizarre plot twist introduced in season one, which had me fuming? – but I don't think I can get into that too much without being spoilery. Also, my reactions are possibly not as mysterious as all that.

To start from the beginning of the second season, three whole episodes seemed to confirm the aforementioned season one plot twist. As Kate Wyler, the US ambassador in Great Britain, put forward her wild theory as to who was really responsible for the bombing of a British ship, she wasn't seriously called into question by her aides and advisors, who should have known better. Instead, they bought into it all, and nervous steps were taken in order to outfox a very unlikely Big Bad. What's worse, the writing seemed to have lost its zing, and the characters tried one's patience, especially Kate and her right hand man Stuart. I mean, I know Stuart survived a car bomb and lost a valued colleague. Still, did he have to be so whiny?

To be honest, I only stuck with the series so I could have the pleasure of rubbishing it later (and spoiling everything). But then, episode four came along and something happened. The zing was back. Stuart stopped being irritating and became quite likeable again, especially when dealing ineptly with his exasperated ex Eidra. We were given some vital information about the bombing of the ship which made the reasons behind it just a grain more plausible. And then, finally, the series back-tracked from previous idiocies. In episode five Allison Janney turned up as a highly competent but hard-ball-playing US Vice President, and things were definitely back on track.

So what happened there? The second season had the opposite trajectory from the first for me: there I was hooked first, disgruntled later, while here I was close to giving up, then hooked in again. It feels as if there are two sets of writers wanting to tell different stories. And that doesn't just go for the political shenanigans. At the end of season one, you had the feeling that we were supposed to root for Kate ditching her wild card husband Hal and hooking up with Austin Dennison, the British Foreign Secretary. But as the ground shifted in season two, Dennison didn't exactly turn out to be someone you could steal horses with (to use a German expression). I was glad, as I thought Dennison was stiff and humourless. Also, Hal is played by Rufus Sewell, so obviously I reckoned Kate should stick with him.

At the very least, I would guess that the writers of The Diplomat did not have the whole plot thought out beforehand. For example, Kate's dithering in the last episodes on whether she should try for the position of Vice President or not feels like a way for the writers to keep their options open. Which leads me to question number two: what kind of show is this? What's the right frame of mind to watch it (if you want to watch it at all)?

Where I went wrong at first was to regard The Diplomat as a fairly ambitious political drama – not as good as The West Wing, naturally, but at least created with the same kind of viewership in mind. But The Diplomat is not even in the same genre as The West Wing. The politics can be absurd, because the politics is not the main concern of the story. It's only there to provide an excuse for dramatic set pieces and character conflict. The Diplomat is less a political thriller, and more a soap opera with some thriller aspects. If you can accept that it bears no hint of a resemblance to how British or American politics work in real life, you can still have fun with it. Although I'm very much afraid Hal will turn out to be the ultimate bad guy in yet another twist somewhere further down the line. (How? I don't know. It's a mystery.)

Also, am I the only one who wouldn't be altogether averse to a gung-ho British PM like Nicol Trowbridge right about now? Just me? OK.

The final Wolf Hall

There must be an end to milking Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall trilogy for blog posts. Even if I finally actually read The Mirror and the Light, instead of just listening to it as an audiobook, I can't possibly have more to say about Mantel's version of Thomas Cromwell after having blogged about Wolf Hall the novel – twice; Bring Up the Bodies – twice; the first series of the TV adaptation of the trilogy; the aforementioned audiobook version of The Mirror and the Light and now, finally, the second series of the TV adaptation. I guess it goes to show that in spite of my gripes – and I've had plenty – I do find this story fascinating.

The second series of Wolf Hall leaves me with two questions I can't quite answer. One, can I recommend this series or not? And two, why don't I like this version of Thomas Cromwell more?

To start with question one, Wolf Hall the TV series has a sharp script, is often mesmerising and contains stellar acting, especially from Mark Rylance as Cromwell and Damian Lewis as Henry VIII but also from just about everyone else. This time around I was especially taken with Harry Melling's Wriothesley. In the novels, Wriothesley was so fox-like his treachery seemed like a foregone conclusion, especially as Cromwell and co. kept jokingly referring to him as "Call Me Risley" or just "Call Me", even to his face. (My theory is that his name is actually pronounced Risley, and he simply tried to convey it in a polite manner.) Melling's Wriothesley, by contrast, suffers pure agony over his own betrayal. That's just one example of the acting quality on offer. I was properly hooked during both the first and last episode of the series, and even got a bit teary as Cromwell in his final speech apologised to his "master", meaning not Henry, as the crowd thought, but the late Cardinal Wolsey.

However, there were other times when the show's sedate pace got me restless. One Swedish journalist wondered, entertainingly, why she had spent twelve hours of her life (counting both series and all twelve episodes of Wolf Hall) watching Cromwell walking from one room to another between dialogues and thoughtful musings. "What's so magnetic about this?" she asked, and I know what she means. I felt the magnetism too, often enough – but not all the time. Sometimes, I just felt impatient with the high-brow-ness of it all. I have principal objections to TV drama that gives itself airs, and this series does. It reminds me most of all of a gigantic filmed play (though it doesn't come off quite as dusty as filmed plays tend to do).

In the end, though, I think I have to recommend the series, with reservations. It does tell an intriguing story with the help of first-class actors. What it doesn't manage to do, even with the help of Rylance's expressive face, is help me understand what Cromwell – the historical or the fictional version – is all about.   

Which leads me to question number two. Why don't I like Mantel's Cromwell more? The answer appears simple enough on the surface: because he's not a charismatic villain in this story. How can a Cromwell who always claims to do the right thing, and often believes it too, hope to compare in my villain-loving eyes to the charms of Danny Webb's weaselly courtier, or James Frain's Catholic-hating powerbroker? It's true that the smugness of Rylance's Cromwell riles me. Smugness is usually the fault of the other guys – the self-righteous ones, the heroes. A great villain can get away with anything, but you have to be a truly A-grade villain (better than Cromwell, certainly) to get away with self-righteousness.

But I think it goes deeper than that. After all three books and two series of television, I'm still not sure I know what makes Mantel's Cromwell tick. Mantel makes much of his devotion to Wolsey, but his actions don't always bear this supposed loyalty out. Yes, he punishes the Cardinal's lesser enemies, but he becomes quite pally with Suffolk, who filched some of Wolsey's land, and keeps serving Henry, who caused Wolsey's fall in the first place. There's even a scene in The Mirror and the Light where Cromwell is suddenly stricken with doubt as to whether he let his Cardinal down at the end. Whoa, buddy. Firstly, you should know whether you were false or not. Secondly, in this version of events, you killed people for being nasty to your beloved Cardinal. If there was any kind of doubt in your mind as to your own actions towards Wolsey, you should maybe have shown more generosity towards others.   

It doesn't help that I feel a certain disconnect between Mantel's Cromwell and the historical Cromwell who, I can't help suspecting, was probably a lot more straightforward. Did the real Cromwell ever give a monkey's about Wolsey? I'm not entirely convinced. 

Maybe, though, this ambiguousness is actually partly why the Wolf Hall trilogy fascinates me. On two levels, it's about achieving great things, but not what you set out to do. Cromwell (as Mantel describes him) wants to be a good servant to Wolsey and to facilitate religious reform; he achieves neither. Mantel, presumably, wanted to get under Thomas Cromwell's skin, but doesn't quite get there. However, it can be gripping to see them try.

The (too) many possibilities of the Multiverse

One of the first multiversal stories I encountered was a Donald Duck comic. The duck protagonist slid into a parallel world somehow, and had some trouble finding his way back home. I remember next to nothing about this adventure – I'm not even sure if its hero was Scrooge or Donald (I think it was Scrooge) – but I remember the "Ooooh, right" moment when he finally figured out what was going on, and how satisfying it was.

Scrooge (or Donald) suddenly remembered the name of the street where he was when everything started to get weird. It had a different name than it usually did. From this memory came the realisation that he was in a parallel universe, similar to his own but just that little bit off. A classic "what's wrong with this picture" tale, for which I'm always an absolute sucker.

This is the kind of multiversal shenanigans I enjoy the most. I like my Multiverse the way I like my time travel: with plenty of illustrations of how small decisions can change everything (no closed "it always happened" time loop, thank you). Or even a small change in circumstances, that works too. The classic romcom Sliding Doors, which is often brought up when discussing stories with what-if scenarios, hinges not on a momentous decision that the heroine makes, but whether she catches a particular train or not. When it comes to multiversal stories, I tend to get extra-nerdy or cod-philosophical: I don't just want to see a different reality, I want to know how it came to be different.

One of the reasons this kind of plot – the "if it hadn't been for if" story, to translate a Swedish (ungrammatical) phrase – appeals to me is that it's so easy to imagine how small changes could have had large consequences in my own life.  Surely it must the same for others too. What if I hadn't got that job? What if I'd chosen another major when studying, or even another university (maybe that's too wild a speculation)? What if I hadn't bonded with one of my besties in primary school? So many important things that happen to you in life seem to happen quite by chance, and could easily have gone another way altogether.

Or could they? Once they're down the rabbit hole of alternative realities, multiversal stories, like time travel stories, can explore "destiny or chance" questions too. It can be just as fascinating to see reality adjust itself in all sorts of improbable ways in order to turn out as it always was (in accordance with the "time as a rubber band" theory) as to see it go completely haywire because someone took another way home from work than usual. The Adjustment Bureau (the film, at least, I haven't read the story) plays with that feeling I think we've all had: that some things were just meant to happen somehow.

But hey, that's just the kind of multiverse stories I like. There are plenty of other kinds. And that, I think, is partly why projects like Marvel's Multiverse Saga have a struggle on their hands. Take the animated Marvel series What If. I happen to enjoy all its three seasons, but the YouTube discussions about the last season that I've seen have tended to be negative. 

Apart from the general consensus that season three wasn't as good as the two others, however, views differed wildly. The post-apocalyptic episode was the best one. The post-apocalyptic episode was the worst one. Seeing a megalomaniac version of Mysterio in it was cool. Seeing Mysterio in it made no sense whatsoever. The episode showing Howard the Duck and Darcy (Jane Foster's sidekick, very human) as a couple was fun and frothy. Or no, it was frankly disturbing. The Watcher intervening in events was no big deal. The Watcher intervening ruined his character. And so on. If the creators of What If watched the same vids as I did, they must have felt confused about where exactly they went wrong.

Quite simply, we tend to want different things from our multiverse stories. Some don't want the nerdy small-events-that-change-everything setup. They'd rather see the Multiverse used as a device for crossovers, mash-ups and different team-ups than we're accustomed to. Deadpool and Wolverine used the Multiverse like that: as an excuse for making meta-jokes about the "dying" Fox universe and its characters (Fox having been bought up by Disney). It had little to say about the importance of choices, but it was a blast. 

I enjoy crossovers too – when it comes to fictional worlds I'm really invested in, I can become obsessed with them. But much as I've come to appreciate the MCU, I'm not quite there yet. As it is, I'll have good time with a multiversal MCU crossover, but I will feel some regret over opportunities lost. When it comes to blending different characters in "what if X had the powers of Y" scenarios, I have no interest in that at all.

Finally, there are multiverse stories where the other worlds the protagonists encounter are completely different, in a "what if the world was ruled by bees?" or "what if we were all potatoes?" kind of way. That could be fun to watch, but it's not what I primarily want from the Multiverse. That, to my mind, is fantasy, which is a different genre. I'm sure there are plenty who'd disagree, however. The Multiverse can be multiple things to multiple potential fans – and that is exactly its problem.

Long John Silver in space

The post-Christmas-holiday blog post is always a hard one. Even writing about something as straightforward and enjoyable as Skeleton Crew is going to be a challenge. And yet it really shouldn't be difficult, because this was the perfect example of a show that decided, early on, what it wanted to be and then stuck with it, without over-complicating things. It wanted to be a coming-of-age story with adventures and pirates thrown in, and it succeeded. That the series was set in the Star Wars universe was a bonus, but didn't distract from the story it wanted to tell.

The finale, which streamed yesterday (at least here in Sweden), stuck the landing, although it was a safe landing rather than a spectacular one. Mysteries that had been hinted at throughout the show were not really resolved or resolved in an off-hand kind of way that far from blew your mind. In the end, though, it didn't matter that much. What Skeleton Crew focused on – its child protagonists, their experiences in an often hostile universe, and their relationship to one another and the enigmatic Jod – it did really well.

The premise is simple enough. A bunch of kids – hero-worshipping dreamer Wim, the timorous but loyal Neel, bossy would-be rebel Fern and her introvert tech-savvy friend KB – live a sheltered but stiflingly regulated life on the peaceful planet At Attin. One day they come across a hidden star ship and accidentally take off to the skies. There are all sorts of complications to coming home. The children learn that their supposedly boring planet is the stuff of legends and hidden away from the rest of the galaxy. The only help they get is from a rusty old pirate droid and a ragged Force-sensitive man called Jod Na Nawood. Wim thinks he's a Jedi. It turns out he's a pirate, but the question is just how hard-bitten he is.

Though the child actors are all excellent – a feat in itself – the favourite part of the series for me was, unsurprisingly, Jod, as played by Jude Law who once again excels in a pirate role. Skeleton Crew unashamedly borrows from a number of pirate yarns (the droid is called SM 33 as a nod to Captain Hook's sidekick Smee), and Jod is clearly closely modelled on Long John Silver in Treasure Island. 

This is good news, not only because Silver is a classy high-prestige villain. One of Silver's many fascinating traits is that you never find out whether he really cares a button for Jim Hawkins. Sentimentalist as I am, I would like to think that he does, and I have a fondness for adaptations where Silver is allowed to have a soft spot for the boy. Nevertheless, in the original novel, there's always an ulterior motive that can explain why Silver is being nice to Jim. You're left guessing if there is any true feeling behind it all, or if he's just being his manipulative self.

The same ambivalence is found in the character of Jod. Sometimes he seems to bond with the children, sometimes he's only looking out for number one. Almost everyone the children come across who also knows Jod warns them not to trust him. So, as with Silver, you're kept guessing. Even when you think you've figured him out, there's a trace of ambiguity left until the very end.

My second favourite thing in the series was SM 33, voiced with salty gusto by Nick Frost. At the beginning I thought he would turn against the kids at some point – starting a conversation with any kind of Smee with the line "I killed your Captain" didn't seem like a great idea – but the story takes another turn, and I didn't mind being wrong one bit. SM 33 has his dark moments, but they tend to be connected to his programming, while when he can get around it and do what he most wants to do, he's on the children's side. He probably never believed Fern was a captain-killer anyway.

I've heard the viewing figures for Skeleton Crew have not been great, which is a shame. Let's hope they improve in the coming weeks through word of mouth. This is fun and charming family viewing, and the palate cleanser the Star Wars franchise needs after the Acolyte misfire. Though I do realise that Star Wars can't always play it as safe as this.