Fleabag

I thought the new episode last night was just as good as the first series, maybe a few too many looks to the camera from Waller-Bridge but overall it was excellent

I'm a sucker for awkward family dark comedy scenes and I can't think of any other shows that do them better off the top of my head. Maybe Flowers

omg this is back on?

ahhhh

It was BBC2 last time around wasn't it.
Was surprised it was BBC1 when i couldn't find it. Said it was a BBC3 production but I think series 1 must have post dated that being a cable channel mustn't it?

Last night's episode on BBC1 was part of what they called a 'BBC3 takeover' on BBC1.

Also, it was my first brush with this series and I thought it was great.

really? I would have thought you would need to have seen the 1st series to fully understand what was going on.

I enjoyed the ep too.

It took three minutes to get who was who at the dinner table, after that it was guns blazing.

I actually thought the dinner scene in series 1 (ep 6) was better than this one.

I really loved that restaurant bathroom.

Yeah, this is as good as the first season! She's awful talented.

holy shit, tonight's episode and particularly the last scene. So much of it was great, Kristin Scott-Thomas! Fleeing the scene but checking out a hot guy as she fled was amaze. But that last scene! Veeeeery interesting!

Does anyone need any exclamation marks? I've got loads!

Wait, there's a new season?! In the US yet?

Oh, not until May.

coff coff tvchaosuk coff coff

Oh for sure I could watch it any number of places, but I have a backlog so might as well wait.

Yeah, this is as good as the first season!

Better. It's lighter on its feet, sharper.

It's relying less on the sex for shock/humour value

I was confused because I think she's performing her original stage version right now in New York

Glad she's got a potential love interest who actually feels worthy of her in the (unnamed?) priest (also KST I guess).

god this show would be a disaster with anyone but PW-B in the lead. ep 2.3 was a riot but it takes a real talent to pull off some of these asides and reaction shots without coming off like a complete prat

Last minute of episode 3 was strange, in a good way. Her breaking the 4th wall, him noticing her doing it, or being somehow absent, which just causes her to do it again...

Is the logical conclusion of this an episode completely directed at us? Would that work?

(It is 2am)

i guess my take was that she's talking to "god" (which is us) in those asides and he is somehow attuned to that, so her self-referential meta self which allows for everything to be taken ironically (and thus bearably) is threatened by him as an interloper... kinda like if someone could read your mind

It's relying less on the sex for shock/humour value

Yeah and it's really ramping up how horrible the family dynamic is. Her relationship with her sister is my favourite thing about the show.

I saw it more as he was the first person who actually paid genuine attention to her and so he noticed that she was tuning out; whether she's tuning out to an inner voice/her PTSD/running self-commentary/God is left neatly ambiguous. And yes, that definitely will have a huge impact on her, because she's used to operating in the totally-ignored-until-acts-out space

A friend thinks she’s talking to Boo (which I don’t think is a spoiler, put like that).

That was more or less my reading stet. A hint that perhaps her talking to the audience is in fact a symptom of the characters' bubbling under mental illness issues, or a coping mechanism, putting her at slight ironic remove from life.

xpost

Anyway, it was a very well done moment that could have been awful in less skilled hands.

In the early episodes I thought the asides were either a piss-take of Miranda or the result of a BBC editor insisting she Mirandafy it 10%. Either way*, it's interesting to she her subvert it.

(*or neither way)

i'd have thought it's an extrapolation of eye-rolling that cynical people do and it's about those kinds of people never really being present therefore the lived experience is always being turned around and made a version of itself for future consumption. it's also about being isolated and having to be yourself and the other you imagine being seen through the eyes of.

xp yeah me too, took me a while to get on board with them and all the lol sex wisecracks

I assumed the audience asides come straight from the stage show

They do and it's a more theatrical gesture than a televisual one since the audience is right there. Doing it on a TV show isn't that unusual but thinking but the shift makes it interesting, it goes from being you to ...who?

this is the best tv show of all time

I personally find the priest character a difficult to believe but have enough faith in FWB to think that he's supposed to be - or that he's not supposed to be but we'll find out later why is like he is and i'll suddenly believe in him.

On the other hand, Killing Eve was not believable, to me, in any way really (I saw two episodes). I do not want to be condescending, and apologies if it sounds so BUT I wonder If Martin McDonagh put her up to writing a serial killer thing which does not seem to be her register at all, based on the episodes I forced myself to finish.

People either loved or hated that, I know. the standard crit that it was "all over the place" is what I felt about it. So many things seemed like they were supposed to be funny but were not at all, for me.

I love the asides and the extremity of it all

I don't think Killing Eve was supposed to be "believable." I liked it for its stylishness, seductiveness and acting.

what's an unbelievable serial killer drama other than that, though?

I mean, what is it other than unbelievable? Reckless, gratuitous, pointless, dangerous? Ah, right, entertaining.

also, stylish, which it wasn't.

Sorry, I know I'm talking to myself here but and no offence is intended to anyone that liked it but... what's the intention in making a TV show about a female serial killer (which there are a notably small number of) and making it (allegedly) stylish and funny? FWB is a good writer but she had just started going out with a man that makes notably misjudged, but highly praised, serial killing/revenge "comedies" when she came out with KE.

a lot of notably's there.

Ugh, no, not the ‘woman takes on new partner’s interests by osmosis’ thing and BTW although she likes her job, Villanelle is better described as a contract killer.

how much were the books written in that tone? I haven't read them but got the impression they were 'irreverent' or what have you

No idea, but it’s worth remembering that until very recently, Luke Jennings was the Guardian’s very underemployed dance critic.

ug myself a bit of a hole there. ignore those posts, i was steaming.

dug

ohhh, I didn't know who she was dating. something new to look up.

I was laughing at this line:

I’ve just been at the Edinburgh fringe, where I saw 50 more exciting shows.

I mean, it might be gauche to drop names in a roundtable like this, but if other shows are worth going to and would hold appeal for this audience, NAME SOME!
That kind of phrasing -- and the following admission that the Waller-Bridge's show is probably pulling traffic to the West End that may not usually attend -- is recognition that the audience might not be fringe festival-goers and it comes off as "well, they're not REAL theater fans.."

Anyone who goes to 50+ comedy shows at the Edinburgh Fringe needs locked up, for their own safety.

I've had Nathan Barley on the mind lately and I immediately went to the scene where the presumably sympathetic character is trying to escape "cool" writing and get a job with a traditional journalism outfit and is trying to pitch a review of his favorite wines and all he comes up with is "French, Spanish..... South French.."

And agreed, people who like binging things at festival shows and people who will go to a one-off incredibly popular theater event have some overlap, but it's not the same demographic!

i kinda thought the Guardian group-chat piece was obviously banal on the face of it and that it didn't require much more explanation but, since you explicitly called me out on it Andrew, I'll co-sign sic (tho i did read the whole thing!) and fgti's assessments above.

That article trafficked in concern trolling ("There are several fat jokes. I was sitting next to a large guy, who was laughing, but I wondered how he felt"), poor frame-of-reference ("It was like MTV Unplugged"), faux-naiveté that self negates itself in the same paragraph ("The monologue is solid but nothing hugely special. And the staging is incredibly ordinary... when you think how many plays are struggling for a stage, it feels slightly unfair when the same thing gets done again. But then, has there ever been a one-woman show in the West End that has been so financially viable? ") and just generally added nothing to the conversation beyond coming up with some real bizarre talking points ("Also what complicates that moment is that Waller-Bridge has the perfect body" <- according to who?). I guess the big takeaway is that Waller-Bridge seems to be "cashing in" on her and her work's popularity by staging a play lots of people want to see? Isn't that how commerce works?

And yes to the suggestion that round tables are generally terrible reflections of writers' capabilities; they're mostly good for fast turnaround and for paying writers partial wages for more words. I'm unfamiliar with the work of all three off the participants in that piece and wouldn't label them as "dumb"; I put the blame more at the foot of the Guardian. It's manufactured backlash clickbait and not well edited.

Since you seem to be implying that I feel otherwise AF, I'll state the obvious here and note that while many millennials can and do write well (about fellow millennials and other topics too!), not ALL millennials can and do write well (about fellow millennials etc) and that being a millennial does not necessarily impart some meaningful insight to the whole of your generation's actions.

tbh there's probably a comedy vein that could be mined about woke millennials cautiously analyzing their surroundings and entertainment media for the correct sympathies and signs while dropping clunkers like "has the perfect body"

Dear Woke People

tbh my own brain has been poisoned by The Discourse which results in a condition where you're unable to have normal conversations where you've internalized new cultural norms and you're in a state of intellectual disrepair constantly hoping you're saying the right things

Well, yeah, the panellists seemed to be, at times, not criticizing the show on its own merits, or engaging with the complexity of its characters, but dissecting whether or not the play/show lived up to their own view of the discourse.

Stating that "a woman taking advantage" (Snapes) might've been written differently post-#MeToo displayed a real lack-of-awareness about the thesis of the show? The show is about people taking advantage, including (especially) Fleabag?

I read it again to make sure that I wasn't wrong that it was a really bad round table, and I'm not wrong. I wanted to scream: she is supposed to be fallible. Did you miss the part where she accidentally kills her best friend by fucking around too much. Did you see the part where her best friend was the only healthy relationship in her life.

Maybe the show is way more simple than I made it out to be, but I don't think it is? I think it's a really complicated and critical show?

And to answer the question "when has there ever been a one-woman show on the London West End that has been so financially viable" like you've seen 50 shows at Edinburgh Fringe but you've never heard of Shirley Valentine?

I didn't watch the first season until recently, and most of the good analyses I read-- in particular, the Kathryn VanArendonk piece for Vulture-- were about the second season. I didn't read any good analyses of the first season, which, to me, had a lot to unpack. Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated!

The problem with any discussion about something that's very popular and already critically acclaimed, let alone a stage show that spawned a successful television series, is the inherent premise that whatever you're watching is good. So you're stuck with tangents about whether it's of its time, or if it holds up after a beloved descendant television program.

The unstated premise I was left with is that the stage show is, in fact, good. People enjoyed it. The large man (!) laughed.

hah, I posted that before your comment, fgti, but it's another angle on the same thing! season two reviews are viewing season one through season two glasses

Season two is generally considered better because it's written for TV - season one landed well because even a well-regarded Fringe show isn't going to be seen by nearly as many people as a TV show in a decent slot - I don't think I've seen anyone saying "I saw the stage show and the first season was better" - which is an obvious angle to send some appropriate people to look at the stage show and discuss it.

I remember this review at the time, which is more straightforward and less thinkpiecey:
https://www.villagevoice.com/2016/09/23/fleabag-is-the-egocentric-comedy-heroine-of-your-dreamsnightmares/

well if you count the televised National Theater as "seeing the stage show," I saw the stage show and the first season was better! Like way better!

Good write-up!

I'm very, very curious about Fleabag's relationship to promiscuous sex. The "best sex of Fleabag's life" scene-- the 55 year old man pounding her while she gazes at the camera-- was shocking to me; mostly because I was sitting there wondering how important, in this scenario, was "the gaze of the audience"? How much of sexuality, to the promiscuous among our ranks, is performative? Idk I have so many questions

if i remember correctly, the punchline to that joke in the theatrical version (and maybe the series? it's been awhile) is the older guy moaning "YOU'RE SO YOUNG, YOU'RE SO YOUNG" which plays to the heart of fleabag's deeply self-doubting sense of intrinsic worth as object and maybe little else. Being desired, by anyone, gives her meaning; being objectified allows her to dodge questions of personal worth because objects don't cause pain or feel pain or need to prove anything. the looks to the "audience" in the series (and literally, to the audience in the play) certainly do play with that dynamic and also with her sense of "performing" for something bigger and more moral than fleabag to give meaning to her life... or that was some of my take at least.

being "young" isn't something fleabag has earned, it's something she's rapidly losing and she's not getting anything in exchange. forcing power to kowtow to that brief lacuna of desirability is clearly more of a turn on than the sex itself for her. we see a lot more of that with the priest where - initially especially - the turn on is in the taboo as much as it is the person. not to spoil, but it's clear to both parties that she's unlikely to stay if he leaves the cloth and that's part of what the ending of s2 is about

I wasn't sure if he was saying "YOU'RE SO YOUNG" or "YOU'RE SO GOOD", or both. And what you're saying tracks with her statement that she LOVES picking up men, but derives less pleasure from the physical act itself as she does from the psychology of it.

I felt there was a startlingly clever mirror to Fleabag's relationship to sexuality in Godmother's sexhibition. Godmother is essentially doing the same thing as Fleabag has been doing the entire series-- performing sex publicly-- but Godmother's audience is the art community, where Fleabag's audience is the viewer. Godmother's sexhibition felt very much in-the-same-vein as Fleabag's initial disclosure (it's not actually about the physical act of sex itself), and then Godmother perfectly criticizes Fleabag, and the entire show in general: "this show is not about sex. It's about power."

Godmother's attempt to use sexuality to install herself as matriarch in Fleabag's family is successful; in contrast, Fleabag's attempt to exist freely, liberated, promiscuously, sexually-- all the while asking herself (or her father) "am I a good feminist?"-- backfires, and directly results in the suicide of her best friend. (The scenes between Fleabag and Boo called to mind something my sibling is often says: "Friendship is the highest form of romance." More recently, they've started replacing "friendship" with "communism" but ymmv I guess.)

A later revelation occurs in Fleabag's conversation with Kristen Scott Thomas's character. Fleabag attempts to exert her power in seducing this older lesbian, but the lesbian wins out-- and imparts to Fleabag an important "lesson" about getting older, and I paraphrase, "after menopause, all that shit stops mattering, and you are free to be who you truly are. A woman in business." Is this a lesson? Or is this another maguffin? The lesbian is suggesting replacing one structure of capital (sexual promiscuity) with another (business), is this meant to be ironic? Or is this meant to actually "teach" Fleabag to find pursuits toward self-worth outside of her sexuality?

(Part of the reason I fell in love with this show is that I oftentimes feel like a Harry in a world of Fleabags. I'm just out here trying to understand promiscuous sexuality and how it works for those who engage in it.)

it works better the less you analyze it (in personal encounters, not in the context of a show about a character that starts off promiscuous) because of the fear your prospective partner might be sexually promiscuous for a reason that turns you off

which, I guess the show covered in the context of the very attractive man who talks about how small her breasts are during sex, among other proclivities

he's handsome, we'll try not to think too much about the rest

The lesbian is suggesting replacing one structure of capital (sexual promiscuity) with another (business), is this meant to be ironic? Or is this meant to actually "teach" Fleabag to find pursuits toward self-worth outside of her sexuality?

Godmother's attempt to use sexuality to install herself as matriarch in Fleabag's family is successful

Wow yeah I forgot about that detail. I forget about so many aspects of this show when I think about it! I had forgotten about "fucked me up the arse" dude

Also I adored the "people are shit" "yes.. but they're also all we've got" moment, directed a little too on-the-nose but the sentiment was nice

works better in the play thru waller-bridge's interp of the guy, imo.

incredible show -- the number of great elements to it is difficult to narrow down, w/obvious accolades going to PWB, but everyone is great. Colman's warmth barely covering her controlling nature and skillful manner of cutting nimbly where it hurts the most is a tricky performance to pull off, the trick being that the only people who see it are the ones she wants to show it to, while everyone else remains charmed and understandably so (if you view it from the perspective of those who don't know her well). A perfect depiction of charisma and false warmth towards others used to keep oneself at the center of attention. Sian Clifford, whom I'm not familiar w/, is this character we're maybe invited to expect to dislike but she's really so likable despite her flaws and short-temperedness w/Fleabag, since we see her through the latter's eyes and despite their falling-out at the end of S1 they just love each other so much and the empathy for the character is so deep. a lesser show would have (and lesser shows have, habitually) created characters exactly like this who are set up to be villains of sorts. not remotely the case here.

also i don't buy the whole premise that PWB's character is presented as this beautiful and funny and hip person, i think the key point there is she's full of so much self-loathing and depression that she can't get past it to see what others do see in her, those moments exist to highlight glimpses into the frailty of everyone else and their own self-image issues coupled w/her own perception of herself being wrong. i mean of course certainly FB spends more time in the series making errors in judgement and being insulted by the people she loves (or being fucked w/by the cruel significant others of those she loves) than she spends it getting compliments.

a lot of the show reminded me of some of the Arnaud Desplechin films i've seen. Kings and Queen, in particularly. just w/regards to certain elements of emotional brutality coming to the fore. it's been a long time since i've seen that one, so i'm not sure how much that comp holds water tbh.

i didn't think the priest was too creepy, i think it was a fairly even-keeled depiction of a flawed man of the cloth caught between two places. he seems like maybe he used to be a male version of FB and has found some solace in this new life and thru no fault of her own she tempts him back into it, and he can't go all the way with leaving it in the end. i thought the depiction was sympathetic enough. i'm saying this w/my perception clouded as the son of a guy who left a seminary to pursue a nun who left the convent and it didn't work in the end so idk.

Fleabag claiming her sister's miscarriage as her own in the first ep of season two is her Jesus moment imo

nice post omar, agree with nearly all of it - esp the description of what Colman / PWB pull off with her character

still bothers me that a catholic priest in full regalia was officiating at a civil wedding in their back garden

Haha, yes.

Agreed, especially regarding her sister and their relationship (also lol the whole haircut issue !).

Finished season two yesterday. It's really amazing, but also quite complex and bittersweet. I loved Martin's big speech as an example of everything you shouldn't say, all 'it's not my fault! I can't help it! you just have to deal with me!' I still haven't really figured out what I thought of the very end, but it seemed to me that both fleabag and hot alcoholic priest decided to keep on working on themselves.

there is exactly one completely horrible person in the series and it's Martin

He was too awful to my taste, at times it really made Claire seem bad as well. He was being so awful to her sister!

Godmother is giving him some serious competition there IMO

most definitely

she's at least consciously and sometimes maliciously bad, and Martin is just a flailing douchebag

Also, the way Gelman delivered that speech was so unexpectedly great; this blubbering pile of terrified vulnerability that still manages to be completely unbearable while being self-aware about how unbearable he is. When I was watching it, I had a very strong "I identify with and wholly reject this" reaction.

Otm. I completely get the feeling. Why does my girlfriend keep getting annoyed that I never do anything I promise her that I'll do, I'm bad at remembering stuff, it's not my fault, she should write it down to me, including specific instructions, it's not my fault!

It's kinda male privilege in the extreme. Or in another way, he's at step one of the twelve step program, and has just decided it's easier to stop there.

I think I'd feel horrible rewatching just for that monologue, but now that you mention it, it's really is *chef kiss* bad

I kept wondering if the part was written with Gelman in mind. I can't imagine anyone else in the role.

Yeah, he really goes for that energy. I kinda hated him in Lemon, though.

His greatest work remains 1,000 Cats.

as per colbert interview, apparently gelman's agent was directly contacted by Amazon's casting people for the part and flew out to the UK the next day for filming.

anyways, my gelman love is always based around his work in Eagleheart which should've gotten him an honorary Tony and/or Pulitzer

Gelman is so good at being an asshole I kind of just assume he is one.

i totally just misremembered The Walking Dead and thought Gelman also played Gregory. Totally different actor.

I’m rarely shocked by anything on a show but when Fleabag shoved her godmother back against the wall in s1 ep5 it was really something. Not even a satisfying moment and just this really raw and believable thing. It also set up the moment of her punching Martin at dinner, since by now it was very much in character, and much later in terms of general show tone made the moment where Martin grabs her by the (cashmere) sweater in an aggressive threatening moment genuinely frightening.

Forgive the thread spam, but I wanted to note that this show's 2019 season is nominated in the 2019 ILX TV poll:

ILX's Best Television of 2019 Poll / VOTING AND CAMPAIGNING THREAD / Voting Ends January 31

If you like this show and you'd like to see it have a good showing in the poll (running in February) all you need to do is submit a ballot including it and your other favorites (4 minimum, 25 maximum, organized by your favorite to least favorite) to forksclovetofu at gmail by end of day today. It'll take five minutes; get to it!