How not to make a TV fantasy series: Cursed on Netflix

As I'm now in my last summer vacation week, one could argue that there are better things to spend my time on than the Netflix series Cursed, which is supposed to have something to do with Arthurian legend but doesn't really. Nevertheless, I have been "hate-watching" the entire ten episodes of the first season (there will probably be more, but I hope I'll have enough sense to stop here). There is something fascinating about the way the series tries and fails to be an epic fantasy adventure by ticking a number of boxes, and at least, unlike The Luminaries (which I don't know if I'll be able to finish), it is bad in an intermittently entertaining way.

The series is actually based on the books (graphic novels, maybe?) of two writers, otherwise one would have thought it the brain-child of a room of script-writers expressly hired by Netflix to come up with the Next Big Thing fantasy-wise, something that can be billed "the new Game of Thrones". I'm not that happy that every fantasy series now is supposed to ape Game of Thrones - I'd much rather see "the new Once Upon A Time" - but the occasional Game of Thrones-iness is not the problem. Indeed, I begin to see why GoT was so highly praised, if Cursed is the kind of dross fantasy fans usually have to contend with. There's a lot of blood, chopping off of limbs and nice side characters being killed off for shock effect (when a kindly lady gives the heroine a pep talk, I knew at once that she and her helpful husband were for it), but otherwise there are no noticeable links to the ambitious, knotty intrigues of GoT. 

The main story of Cursed is simple enough. There is the heroine, Nimue, who is neither a dark sorceress and beguiler of Merlin (that would be awkward, seeing as he's her dad) nor the usually nice and pro-Arthur Lady of the Lake. (She is in a lake at one time, but only to kill enemies.) When she gets hold of a magic sword, it responds to her, and there's never any question of handing it over to Arthur - here a happy-go-lucky wannabe knight and love interest to Nimue who (mostly) doesn't mind playing second fiddle to her. Nimue belongs to the fey, a host of magical creatures who are hunted down and killed by evil monks. When her village is destroyed, her mother with her dying breath tells Nimue to get a magic sword the mother's been hiding to Merlin. When she finally meets Merlin, though, Nimue starts to question whether handing the sword over to this slippery customer is such a great plan. Instead, she holds on to it and becomes the leader of the poor, persecuted fey who - wouldn't you know it - have formed a Resistance. Only, the sword (never named as Excalibur, but plainly meant to be it) is coveted by the king and a rival pretender as it would shore up their claims to the throne. The evil monks aren't too fussed about the sword, except as a source of magic, but they want to burn Nimue and all of the good, noble, diversity-embracing close-to-nature fey, because the fey are different and the evil monks are basically Medieval-style Nazis.

I have seen many a weird take on the King Arthur story in my day, but none which strays so far from any resemblance to any Arthurian legend, at least any I'm familiar with. It's not that Cursed stands the usual stories on their heads - that has been done many a time - more that it's completely unrelated to the usual stories. The characters with names from the King Arthur story don't stand in any recognisable relation to one another. Arthur is not related to Uther Pendragon, and if he ever makes king it will have to be by default when all the kick-ass heroines are gone. Gawain, Percival and Lancelot have no connection to their Round Table counterparts - they're just important characters in the general scheme of things who for some reason have been named after the knights in question. Arthur's sister is called Morgana, and she does dabble in magic towards the end, but that's it. It's also worth noting that the Morgana Le Fey of legend in this series is one of the few good (so far) protagonists who are not fey. Here is an instance where the writers could have dispensed with the Arthurian name-dropping altogether and given the characters different names, and nothing would have changed. It's not as if magic swords and sorcerers can't exist outside of an Arthurian-legend context.

Even as its own thing, though, this series is bad. It's so simplistic it's laughable, and in love with its own wokeness in a way that will make few converts. Fantasy can include a great deal of warrior heroines and melting-pot casting without it seeming strange or programmatic - after all, in a magical make-believe land, anything goes, and you're not in any way restricted by historical facts from the "real world". Still, the self-congratulatory tone grates - "look, we have lesbian nuns, aren't we enlightened?" What bothered me most, though, was the treatment of the Big Bad - the evil monks, otherwise known as "red paladins".

Menacing monks and shady clerics are something of a mainstay of popular entertainment, and usually I don't mind it - you have to be able to separate the character from the faith. Normally, somewhere in the story, someone will make a little Cadfaelesque speech on how the churchy bad guys in question seem to have forgotten all about the Christian virtues of kindness and mercy etc., or it will be made clear in some other way that the fanatics have got the wrong end of the stick. I'm not sure firmly secular writers always feel very warmly about inserting this kind of "look, we're not saying all Christians are bad" parenthesis in their work, but it's a show of good manners. We get nothing of this in Cursed, though. Here, all Christians are bad, period. The red paladins are backed up by a (literally) pox-ridden Pope. There's a Mother Abbess at one time who doesn't give Nimue away (without giving a reason: here a Cadfaelesque speech would have slotted in nicely), but otherwise, the nuns that are helpful to her are those who aren't in fact pious at all. The only nun displaying signs of piety is a young girl who's a murderous nutcase. We have several scenes where characters pray before an altar and are troubled because they don't feel any response - Morgana, at the end of such a scene, throws away her cross and joins the fey, as if there has to be a choice of the one or the other. Peter Mullan as Father Carder, the head Evil Monk, does his level best, but he's given nothing to work with, as every religious speech he or any one else gives feels false and hollow. The writers clearly don't "get" religion, which is fine, but they would in that case have been on firmer ground had they invented a religious sect of their own to play the baddies (similar to the followers of "The Lord of Light" in Game of Thrones). Quite apart from religious allegiance, it's a problem when a story is unable to explain the driving forces of its villains. As a comparison, the moral system of the Star Wars films may be black and white, but Palpatine still makes a darn good case for the Dark Side. 

There are good things in this series, such as the beautiful animated intro, some of the acting (the guy who plays Uther overacts painfully, though), and the way new plots and characters get thrown into the mix so as to liven things up a bit - a leper king, a pirate queen, a Viking pretender, a probably hostile old spirit taking over Morgana etc. I thought they tried too hard with making Merlin quirky and different at first, but he works well enough in the long run, and as a Swede I never object to seeing a Skarsgård as part of the cast. But if you want a popular-culture take on King Arthur and co., you're better off with Merlin (also on Netflix).   

Why Belgravia lacks the secret Downton ingredient

I've not been very lucky with my reading lately - there have been a couple of rereads and nothing very blogworthy. I did manage to finish Alix E. Harrow's The Ten Thousand Doors of January but I didn't care for it, and I don't feel that inclined to launch into a potentially contentious rant explaining why. (My favourite character was Mr Locke. He turns out to be the villain. And believe you me, that is not a spoiler.)

It seems, then, that I will have to stick to the TV series theme for a bit. Luckily, my streaming services have obliged me by providing decent material. I acquired a new service (free the first year: after that an absolute bargain) mainly so I could finally watch Belgravia, adapted by Julian Fellowes from his novel. Now, I actually read Belgravia when it first came out. It was published in instalments electronically and could be accessed by a mobile app, so it was the first (and probably the last) novel I read on my phone. The electronic reading experience wasn't great: I found it hard to make my mobile understand when I wanted to turn the page, and the screen went into idle mode every few minutes. This may have coloured my perception of the book, but I remember not being very impressed with it. Never mind not measuring up to Downton: the main problem was that it wasn't nearly as good as other novels by Fellowes, Past Imperfect especially. It felt a bit flat and full of forced exposition about 19th-century London, which could then be linked to more information about the history being explored. I'm afraid watching the adaptation doesn't do much to dispel these impressions, though it's considerably more enjoyable to get acquainted with Belgravia this way as opposed to per app.

The background of the story goes as follows. In 1815, before the battle of Waterloo, Sophia Trenchard and Edmund Bellasis, son of the Earl of Brockenhurst, get together in Brussels. They marry in secret (Sophia is the daughter of the English army's supplier and therefore as common as they come). Before Edmund rides off to battle, Sophia sees the parson who married them get up on the horse next to him, also dressed as an officer. She therefore concludes that she was tricked into a fake marriage and that an army pal of Edmund's helped him out with getting her into bed. Edmund dies in the battle and Sophia discovers that she is pregnant.

Fast-forward twenty-five years or so. Sophia's father James Trenchard has made good and is now a wealthy property developer, though the aristocracy and gentry still look down on him, much to his distress. Mrs Anne Trenchard meets Lady Brockenhurst, Edmund's mother, at a tea party. After having thought it through she goes against her husband's wishes and informs Lady Brockenhurst that she has a grandchild. Sophia died in childbirth, and her son has been raised by a respectable couple without knowing anything about his background. He is now a promising young manufacturer called Charles Pope.

It's a good set-up for plotting and counter-plotting, if you can swallow the premise that no-one even thought of looking into Edmund's pal's credentials during all this time. What with Edmund being such a decent chap, is it likely that he would treat his lady love so shamefully? Yet not even Sophia questions it, only Edmund's own mother when she eventually hears the story (and she assumes that Sophia was a hussy and that no marriage, sham or otherwise, took place). Even as a supposed bastard, though, Charles Pope puts a lot of noses out of joint as both Lady Brockenhurst and the Trenchards make much of him. The Brockenhurst heir, John Bellasis (the villain), and Trenchard's son Oliver both have good reason to ask themselves why this young sprig of a wool merchant is favoured above them. 

So, what's missing, then? The reviewer in The Daily Telegraph complained that the series and character lacked the Downton warmth, and I think she's on to something. It's worth remembering that Downton Abbey's characterisation wasn't very subtle to begin with, and the characters only acquired depth as the story went on. Nevertheless, it is disappointing that the two families involved in Belgravia's intrigues elicit so little sympathy. One major drawback for me was that I couldn't warm to Anne Trenchard. She is clearly supposed to be the Voice of Reason, yet in one of the first scenes (set in 1815), she complains about her husband having obtained invitations to a high-class ball where she feels they will be out of place. It is true that the Trenchards are out of their depth at such a gathering, but whingeing about it and wincing every time her husband makes a faux pax isn't going to improve matters. Tamsin Greig does what she can with the part, but the fact remains that Anne lacks the kind, forbearing nature of, say, Mrs Hughes in Downton. The scenes where Greig's Mrs Trenchard faces off Harriet Walter's Lady Brockenhurst may be the best in the series - they have a good dynamic - but there is zero chemistry between Mr and Mrs Trenchard. When their marriage hits the rocks, one feels that there was not much marriage left to ruin. Compare these marital scenes with the ones between Lord and Lady Grantham in Downton, and the aforementioned lack of warmth is apparent.

Belgravia is still very much worth the watch, and bears the Fellowes hallmark all right. The characters get down to business in a refreshingly down-to-earth manner without much flim-flammery. When John Bellasis's mother - married to an inveterate gambler - discovers that her son has robbed her of her little hoard of silver which she kept for an emergency, she doesn't go to pieces, merely sits down on the bed and resignedly hopes that he'll make good use of the money. When apparent calamity hits them, Fellowes characters face facts and make the best of things. Fellowes is also very good on English snobbery, as someone who - I imagine - hasn't been above serving up a few put-downs of his own in his day. When English snobbery is being satirised by an outsider, it's often overdone, and they miss the hurtful sharpness of it. A snobbish English put-down is as often as not dressed up as a pleasant remark, so that the snubbers can then tell themselves "Oh, I'm sure X didn't get that anyway". But if you do get it, you feel insulted twice over, as you have apparently been dismissed as stupid as well as vulgar.

If you catch it and are a fan of early Downton, you'll have a good time with this series. For my part, I'm still looking out for The Gilded Age, but with less and less hope that it will contain a satisfying villain.

What's with the slow costume dramas?

What's wrong with the BBC nowadays? It's been ages since I've watched a decent costume drama from them. This is by no means the first costume drama slump - I spent a good part of 2010 pining after the good old days of Dickens adaptations by Andrew Davies and other delights. Then ITV launched Downton Abbey, and eventually the BBC rose to the challenge, after unsuccessfully having tried to catch the public's interest with "anti-Downton" projects. (Well, all right, I admit the public do seem to like Peaky Blinders.) But now here we are again. With the exception of Poldark, which I may have given up on after two series but was at least pacy, costume-drama efforts by the Beeb are tending towards the dark, slow and sententious. It's almost funny how they've managed to put even me off buying the latest War of the Worlds adaptation, though I'll dutifully watch it if a TV channel or streaming service obliges, for the sake of Carlyle. Gay astronomer? Fine, it's Edwardian England after all, and I'm used to fancying gay characters (could have done without the funny glasses, though). Strong female protagonist who isn't in the book? Bit weird, but I haven't read the book, and she's played by Eleanor Tomlinson, so. Anti-imperialist waffling? Ugh, if you must, H.G. Wells would probably have loved it. Humankind going to pot even though they defeat the Martians? OK, now you've lost me.

What's brought my present anti-BBC sentiments on, except their hiring Sarah Phelps to butcher Christie again and again? (I regret being gracious about her  And Then There Were None now - if you don't get the main premise of the victims being indirectly guilty of murder, then you don't get the genius of Christie's plotting, and I should have realised that.) It's mostly down to The Luminaries, which has been snapped up by HBO Nordic and which I consequently have been able to watch practically at the same time as the UK. Now The Luminaries is by no means the worst costume drama the BBC has produced - it doesn't offend me the way, say, The Pale Horse travesty did. It's helped by the fact that it's an adaptation of a novel by a modern author, albeit set in the 19th century, so we don't get the painful spectacle of a script writer trying to "fix" the story by bringing in more "modern relevance". In fact Eleanor Catton - who wrote the novel - is herself responsible for the script, which means it must at least be respectful (I haven't read the original novel). At the same time, depressingly, letting authors adapt their own book seldom works well. You need someone with a bit of knowledge as to how the TV medium (as opposed to the written word) works. The Luminaries has some things going for it, but it's very, very slow.

Some positives first. As per usual with British drama, it's well-acted, and the settings look fine. The story takes place in New Zealand in the 1860s, and there's a gold rush going on, so there's a rag-tag, Wild West feel about the larger town the heroine reaches at the beginning of the story (um... not sure which town it's supposed to be now) and the smaller village she later ends up in. An early scene where the purity of a digger's gold is tested on the open street feels just exotic enough to catch one's interest. The Beeb can indulge in hiring a multi-ethnic cast without it looking out of place for the setting: in fact the plot demands it, which the execs must have loved. The characters are connected in intriguing and intricate ways. Though some of the characterisation seems clichéd - the prejudiced sheriff, the well-meaning but weak clergyman, the spineless politician etc. - there are some surprises along the way. The main villain, or villainess, is Lydia Wells (played by Eva Green, having fun), and she's worse news than the sheriff, the unscrupulous pimp and the ex-convict (her lover) combined. At this stage, not even a tragic back-story could make anyone believe that her actions are all the fault of the patriarchy. Her husband, Crosbie Wells, first looks like he's some drunken lout she got stuck with, but he turns out to be an intelligent man with a knack of befriending people.

But oh, the slowness. Eve Hewson, who plays the story's heroine Anna Wetherell, is lovely to look at: however, seeing her mooching around miserably in scene after scene with melancholy music in the background just gets too much. I watched the first three episodes available on HBO in the middle of the day two days in a row (my summer holiday has started, blissfully) and did not expect to be overly stimulated, but I was still frustrated by the snail's pace of the plot progression. Whenever Lydia and her ex-con squeeze were hatching some scheme (what's he doing in New Zealand, incidentally? Convicts were never sent there) things picked up, but none of the other story lines are that engaging. I liked Crosbie Wells, but I don''t much care who eventually shot him. Emery Staines, Anna's love interest and potential soul mate, is charming (Himesh Patel gets to show that the wetness of Jack Malik in Yesterday wasn't his fault) and his Maori pal Te Rau is sweet, but their adventures are hardly gripping either, and Anna just seems to be set up to be the perpetual victim.

From what I can see on IMDB, the series is only six episodes long all in all, so I'll probably watch all of it, being half-way in. However, I'm still waiting for a real return to form on part of the BBC. As costume drama is not the only thing they've handled less than competently lately - for instance, they've arrogantly dismissed well-founded criticism of Chris Chibnall's era of Doctor Who - maybe a more far-reaching rethink of the corporation's priorities is needed. Still, what do I know: it's not my tax money that's at stake here, after all.