Paul's been resurrected. He has gained awesomely cool powers. Neil has kidnapped Mac. He has not gained awesomely cool powers. Everyone else has left town, except Paul's family and Mac's Dad, who is searching for his son.
John, the leader of The Fades, has a bone to pick with Paul. Paul killed his love, Natalie, and he wants revenge. He sends out the troops to bring him in, all the while preparing for their final encounter.
Meanwhile, Paul discovers that he could reopen Ascension. However, he can't reopen the Ascension Point in the woods, so must find another way.
Neil, frustrated by not being able to get through to Paul (his phone is off), kidnaps the rest of his family as added insurance. Naturally, this catches Paul's attention. From there, Neil tries to dictate Paul's actions, attempting to get him to destroy John and the rest of the Fades.
Things are getting to breaking point. Who will survive, and who will die? Because Paul's time is ticking away.
* * *
I always dread the end of a series. Yes, it's usually great fun, tense, awesome, etc, etc. But they spoil it sometimes by making it too tense, by removing the soul of the thing sometimes. This, I suppose, is that which I hate about dark, unhappy endings.
I can honestly say that this episode was shocking in many ways. There's a very, very surprising death, a very unsurprising death in a good way, a prophecy fulfilled and an explosive ending.Now that's all very well and good, but there are other things that add up to make a good, watchable TV program. Elements of comedy, love, and other stuff like that really add to a program.
Unfortuantely, this episode had neither comedy (mostly) nor any tender love as such. The closest we get to that is a scene in which two folk are locked inside a shipping crate. As far as comedy goes, Mac's up to his usual tricks, but nothing more. What we do get is little enough.
It was the soul-destroying second half that really got me. After a rather unexpected and shocking death, Paul is a bit broken and allows himself to be influenced by Neil, who is no longer very nice. There's also the impending hour of Paul's death among the ashes of a world with something blazing behind him.
So the prohecy that Paul is given is that he shall be killed by John in the ashes of the world, or at least that's how he sees it. The reality is a bit different, but not much different. But you'll see about that if you see the thing.
The end is kind of depressing. After Paul wins the day (supposedly), there's no rejoicing. After all, Paul has just suffered a huge loss. When Mac and another (no, I'm not saying who) arrive on the scene and are all happy, Neil is collapsed in a gutter, which I was kind of pleased to see. He had it coming after all he did. But then he starts gabbling about having told Paul not to mess with Ascension. Turns out that it was the only thing that he was right about.
* * *
So a pretty great series is over. Unfortunately, this episode isn't the best. The Fades' deaths are pretty ace, but the violence is a bit savage and all the scenes seem to have something threatening or dire about them, which I'm sure is intended, but lessens the overall enjoyment of the thing.
I'll give this episode a six of ten. It's great, it really is, but I didn't really enjoy it. The shocking death to which I refered earlier really put a damper on things, and the violence was a bit intense. Also, Paul finally using his wings sort of brought up the 'Huh?' feeling until I remembered where he'd gotten them from. The very last to minutes are a bit sad - no happy ending for Paul.
All in all, too tense and too dark.
Here's the link to the iPlayer vid: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b016dkxj/The_Fades_Episode_6/
No comments:
Post a Comment