Tags
alex, barry grand hotel, being human, bobby, captain hatch, damien molony, favourite series, ghosts, gordon kennedy, hal, kate bracken, kathyrn prescott, michael socha, mr rook, natasha, phil davis, ricky grover, series five, steven robertson, the devil, tom mcnair, vampires, werewolf
The last series. Ever. At all. (Probably.) (Probably definitely.)
Same house, same vampire, same werewolf, same swirly carpet. New ghost. New stains on said swirly carpet. The Cafe on the Corner is no more (long live Fanny and her Rest Stop) and instead we have the Barry not-so-Grand Hotel. God only knows what Trip Advisor makes of it!
“Clean, reasonably priced, slight smell of brimstone. Service rather variable.”
New baddie, in fact a capital letters Big Bad, assorted new vamps/ghosts/werewolves and some things we always knew we’d never see. Or so Toby ‘Pants On Fire’ Whithouse said. And no. Not Damien Molony’s nipples, although they were unduly prominent throughout the six (yes a whole six) episodes..
This is a tough one to think through – if you read my reviews you probably realise this isn’t my favourite series although there was much to like. And some to like a lot. And too much that I didn’t like as much… But that’s a discussion I’ll have with myself on another day and in another post. So I’m not thinking about the parts I struggled with but just the good stuff, the bits that made me laugh and wonder and ponder and that felt like ‘my’ Being Human.
So… in the oh so traditional no particular order…
Rook finding new uses for the humble pen. Eye eye…
Whispering in their ear to persuade people to kill themselves in increasingly horrible ways. Nice skill. I’m very, very slightly jealous of that…
The Devil on the battlefield drinking a nice cup of tea from his flask while seated in a deckchair. How terribly British. Shame he didn’t have a knotted hankie on his head. Although I suppose it gets caught in his horns.
Toby (PoF) Whithouse (not Tony Whitehouse as my spellchecker seem determined to insist) himself as the Home Secretary – although the suit did seem keen to take all the limelight! Maybe not the tour de force of an acting performance that we’d expect but as he’d always said he wouldn’t be in it it did made me smile. And I really wish he had waved at the camera.
Some great value guests. Ricky Grover’s Bobby was funny and sad and touching and gone too soon, Kathryn Prescott was straight in with a wonderful portrayal of lonely Natasha, desperate to impress her rescuer Rook, that had all the depth that was missing from other characters like… No. I said I wasn’t going there. Alex’s dad in the final episode was a bitter-sweet turn by Gordon Kennedy and brought a lot of background to Alex’s character – but perhaps too little too late. Lots of good stuff there to get your teeth into – as opposed to those who got their teeth into the scenery…
Learning Victorian slang – dollymop and flapdragon. Rude!
The Men with Sticks and the Men with Ropes – my first thought was is everyone behind the doors an ex-soap star? I thought they all moved to Newcastle but it’s clearly just a code for Purgatory. And wouldn’t it be fab if your door opened to the Easties Duff Duff Duffs…
I’ve always been curious about TMWSaTMWR (WBBFOTBBW) (to be pedantic) but Toby said he’d never show them as they are far scarier in our imagination. He was right but even without being utterly terrifying I liked Martin Hancock’s brief appearance as The Leader. (Insert your own spider and web jokes here) (Why should I do all the work?) I could have done without the swirly whirly picture stuff though – did someone get a new effects programme for their birthday? The Leader was more chilling without them and good writing and acting makes the effects superfluous. Save the money – it could have paid to put a tuck in the Home Secretary’s suit…
The scene between Alex and Hal in the Barry Island bandstand which confirmed to me that Kate Bracken is one of the most promising finds amongst the BH alumni.
Nice use of lots of bits of Tredegar House as a location – although Lady Mary and Alex chatting in Herrick’s 1933 Paris hotel room was a little disconcerting to the sharp-eyed. Location wise this was the best – the hotel was suitably naff and nasty and not unlike so many others and HH is just HH but nothing else really stood out as intriguing this year. Hal was undoubtedly horrified at how dreadfully common it all was. Although Tom took Natasha to Cutler’s smart, gothic/modern restaurant. Which is also where the trio went for supper in THAT extra scene. So presumably they either get a cracking discount or it’s the only joint in town… I wonder if they had the Shiraz or the Merlot?
The Devil’s monologues and speeches. All of them. Wonderfully done by the marvellous Phil Daniels and extra special kudos for the final one over the emergency broadcast channels. Probably up there with my favourite speeches in all five series of Being Human. I agree with him as well – we humans really do fuck stuff up big style. And speaking of which – speeches not fuck ups – this one was the push for me to make this series’ choice.
In the end it wasn’t a hard choice to make. It had to be the last one and to be totally honest because it was the last one. To be fair it had some cracking moments and sadly some right clunkers. It also had me throwing things at the TV during the fake sunshine happy-ever-after interlude. But I got over that when the bleak realisation dawned. Yes I know – I’m happier when it’s dark! It wasn’t such a bad end to a show that I did – and still do – love. Even though this series tested that love to the limits. However, given that I am notoriously commitment phobic in every way that counts I suppose five series might always have been pushing the faith a bit!
If only it weren’t for that damned DVD extra.
But that’s a whole different story for another time…
In the meantime one more post in this series – my best bit of all the best bits. Or all the best bits that count in these blogs anyway!
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The series five trailer – well, the first series five trailer before what we all know was finally and formally confirmed that it would be the last one. Another, revised trailer swiftly followed – which – of course – made it all better. A little like putting a novelty Mr Men sticking plaster on the remains of an amputated limb…