More Wolf Hall

[tealin]

Last night was the last episode of Wolf Hall. Alas! What shall I do with my Wednesday nights now?

Well, last for a while anyway ... they've optioned the third book but it's still being written, sooo ... we've got a bit of a Sherlock scenario going on ... except we know how it's going to end. Even if you didn't know how it was going to end you could probably guess because we've had foreshadowing liek woah, only done nice and subtly and neatly, not like a 2x4 to your head, which is why I love this show and everything about it so much.

It's all yours now, North America! PBS, April 5th! Bee there or bee a rectangular thynge!

Comments

[inevitableentresol]

The episodes just got darker and darker. And there was torture in this series from the start.

I was really shocked at the Anne Boleyn execution scene. I knew it was coming. But that didn't seem to matter, even though they didn't show that much. Henry's glee afterwards was horrific.

I felt so sorry for that boastful, foolish lute player who effectively killed so many people with half a dozen words. Although if it hadn't have been him, it would have been someone else.

[tealin]

But it was done so magnificently WELL! So many things are just dark for the sake of dark, but this had all its ducks in a row and approached it with such sophistication ... Yes the Anne Boleyn scene was excruciating, but it should be! If they'd been gorier or more explicit it wouldn't have been so hard to watch. The spectacle of explicit violence in things like Game of Thrones counterintuitively puts an emotional distance between you and the horror ... every good horror director knows the real stomach-churning stuff is what you put in the audience's mind without showing them. What happened was horrific, and it should feel horrific; anything less would cheapen the story.

And OMG yes, that last scene with Henry was absolutely monstrous – like the close of The Godfather but ten times more operatic and just WOW. Definitely going to be keeping track of this Kosminsky fellow, he knows what he's doing.

[inevitableentresol]

Wolf Hall makes me want to go back and watch The Government Inspector. I heard at the time it was good but I avoided it because it sounded depressing.

The Godfather is a good comparison. Wolf Hall also has that sense of brooding and unspeakable power which can only lead to bad things to come.

[tealin]

Gosh I didn't even know about that – what a great story to dramatise! Thanks for the recc, I'll definitely have to look that up, though perhaps after a margin of time given who's the lead actor. :)