The Red Woman (S6x01)

Airdate: 24 April 2016

Written by: David Benioff & D.B. Weiss Directed by: Jeremy Podeswa

Running Time: 50 minutes

By the time the fifth season of Game of Thrones had concluded, it was evident that showrunners David Benioff and D. B. Weiss were sailing through uncharted and increasingly perilous waters. The series had begun to seriously run out of its literary source in George R. R. Martin’s notoriously unfinished series of novels. While some plot threads and characters from the published works remained to be addressed, the creative team was, by this juncture, left to mainly make it up as they went along. That newfound narrative freedom, at its best, produced moments of thrilling television; at its worst, it led to contrived plotting and character assassination of a different kind. The Red Woman, the premiere of Season Six, is a notable and deeply emblematic example of this precarious phase—an episode that manages to be structurally solid yet simultaneously highlights the alarming creative cracks beginning to fissure the grand edifice of the show.

The episode’s most immediate success, and the primary engine for its record-breaking ratings, was its exploitation of the neat, if all-too-obvious, cliffhanger that closed Season Five: the assassination and apparent death of Jon Snow. The consequences of that event meticulously frame the entire episode, from its chilling opening to its melancholic close. It begins with the grim, pragmatic horror of Ser Davos Seaworth discovering Jon’s bloodied corpse in the snow and, with the help of the loyal Eddison Tollett, transporting it to a storeroom. Edd and the handful of loyalists swear revenge, while Ser Alliser Thorne and his conspirators attempt to woo the rest of the Night’s Watch by justifying their treacherous act with rhetoric echoing Brutus and the murder of Julius Caesar. Barricaded inside, Davos—a political survivor, not a warrior—has no inclination to surrender to Thorne’s offered mercy, understanding its hollow nature. The most significant development in this strand, however, belongs to Melisandre. Her faith in her own prophetic abilities is visibly, devastatingly shaken by Jon’s death, which directly contradicted her vision of him fighting amidst the flames of Winterfell. This crisis of belief culminates in the episode’s final, haunting image: removing her enchanted choker, she reveals herself not as the imperious, youthful priestess, but as a grotesquely ancient woman, her body frail and withered.

Elsewhere, the episode briskly addresses another cliffhanger from the previous season’s finale. Theon and Sansa’s desperate leap from Winterfell’s walls is revealed to have been survived by a fortuitous landing in a deep snowdrift. Their respite is brief, as they are mercilessly hunted by Ramsay Bolton’s men and hounds. Ramsay’s motivation here is presented with a sliver of complexity: he is genuinely angered by the death of his favourite concubine, Myranda, yet is equally, if not more, concerned that his father Roose might disinherit him if he fails to recapture his politically vital wife, Sansa. The duo is eventually run to ground, only to be rescued in an opportune, albeit slightly convenient, moment by Brienne of Tarth and Podrick Payne. The ensuing action scene is visceral and realistically messy, with Podrick’s clumsy but determined efforts perfectly illustrating a less-skilled fighter alongside a knight of Brienne’s calibre. Her subsequent oath of fealty to Sansa Stark provides one of the episode’s few unambiguously satisfying beats, a long-awaited fulfilment of a narrative promise.

In King’s Landing, the mood is one of grim aftermath. Cersei Lannister’s anticipation of a reunion with her daughter Myrcella curdles into devastating heartbreak as Jaime returns with the girl’s corpse, revealing her poisoning at the hands of the Sand Snakes. The parallel storyline sees Queen Margaery still languishing in a cell within the Great Sept of Baelor, where the High Sparrow continues his soft-spoken but relentless campaign to break her spirit and extract a confession. These scenes are functional, serving to establish the season’s stakes in the capital, but they lack the political intricacy that once defined the show’s treatment of the Red Keep.

It is in Dorne, however, where The Red Woman commits what many viewers, particularly fans of the novels, would consider its most egregious sin. The potentially catastrophic political consequences of Myrcella’s murder are rendered moot in the most absurdly simplistic fashion. Ellaria Sand and Tyene simply assassinate Prince Doran Martell—one of the realm’s most cautious and formidable political players—along with his bodyguard Areo Hotah and the maester, seizing power in a bloody coup. The last loose end, Doran’s son Trystane, is disposed of with laughable ease by Obara and Nymeria Sand, who are revealed to have been conveniently hiding aboard his ship in King’s Landing’s harbour all along. This entire sequence reduces one of the Seven Kingdoms’ most fascinating and distinct regions to a mere garden palace, dispatches a deeply strategic character with bewildering abruptness, and introduces glaring continuity errors.

Across the Narrow Sea, the episode diligently sets up the season’s arcs in Essos. In Meereen, Varys and Tyrion confront a deteriorating situation in Daenerys’s absence, with support waning even among the freed slaves. The threat is made spectacularly clear when the Sons of the Harpy burn the vast fleet Daenerys had planned to use for the invasion of Westeros. Meanwhile, Daario Naharis and Jorah Mormont track Daenerys to the Dothraki Sea, only to discover she has been captured by a khalasar led by Khal Moro (Joe Naufahu). In a scene that emphasises the cyclical nature of her journey, Daenerys finds herself once again at the mercy of Dothraki tradition. Despite her status as the widow of the great Khal Drogo, Moro—while showing her a degree of respect—inviolably upholds the custom that all widowed khaleesis must spend their remaining days in the sacred city of Vaes Dothrak, effectively making her a prisoner once more.

In Braavos, Arya Stark’s punishing apprenticeship with the Faceless Men continues. Now blind as a consequence of her disobedience, she is forced to beg on the streets, periodically beaten by the Waif in a cruel regimen designed to break down her identity. It is a bleak, punishing thread, its purpose clear but its execution feeling somewhat like narrative marking time.

Directed by Jeremy Podeswa, The Red Woman is, on a technical level, a solid piece of television. It is competently paced, looks superb, and features several strong performances, particularly from Liam Cunningham and Carice van Houten. Yet, solidity is not what the fandom craved at this precipice. The episode does little to allay the growing fears regarding the series’ declining quality in its post-source-material era. It continues storylines, provides new cliffhangers, and contains individual elements of excellence, but it is also riddled with abysmal missteps. In their attempt to steer the saga without Martin’s detailed charts, Benioff and Weiss make serious errors of judgement that, in some cases, paint them into narrative corners from which they would struggle to escape.

The episode’s good elements, as noted, are worth commending. The rescue of Sansa and Theon is a standout action sequence, notable for its grounded chaos. The continued shading of Ramsay Bolton, showing him capable of a flicker of genuine sorrow for Myranda before callously ordering her body fed to the dogs as “good meat,” adds a sliver of disturbing complexity to the show’s primary monster. Most memorable, of course, is the revelation of Melisandre’s true form. It is a masterful piece of visual storytelling and a brave subversion. After years of the show arguably providing fan service by featuring van Houten in a state of undress at every opportunity, the showrunners seemingly offered a stark atonement: replacing that image with one designed to haunt the viewer—a grotesquely ancient, naked crone. The combination of heavy makeup on van Houten’s face and a digitally imposed senior body is unsettlingly effective. The scene’s conclusion, with this ancient woman covering herself with a blanket as she retreats to bed, injects a sudden, surprising pang of humanity and sympathy into her character.

Furthermore, the episode should be commended for its narrative restraint regarding Jon Snow. It resists the easiest route of revealing his wounds to be superficial or resurrecting him immediately. For the entire hour, he remains unequivocally dead, forcing the narrative to briefly grapple with the tangible consequences of his loss, a gravity that is often missing from later revivals in popular culture.

Yet, for these merits, the episode’s failures are more notable and far more damaging to the long-term integrity of the story. The first, and perhaps most fundamental, is the lack of a coherent justification for Jon Snow’s assassination itself. Ser Alliser Thorne’s passionate speech to the Night’s Watch, though well-delivered by Owen Teale, cannot mask the staggering illogic of the act. Beyond an irrational, longstanding hatred of the Wildlings, the conspiracy makes no strategic sense. Jon Snow was the Lord Commander, a proven fighter, and the primary figure holding the Wall against the existential threat of the White Walkers. Murdering him on the eve of that war is not merely treacherous; it is suicidally stupid. The show asks us to believe that seasoned men like Thorne would prioritise petty prejudice over the survival of the realm, a characterisation that feels shallow and plot-driven.

However, the Dorne subplot represents an even greater creative failure, one that arguably infuriated the novel-reading contingent more than any other. The coup is not just simplistic; it is narratively bankrupt. Prince Doran Martell, a character of immense patience, hidden strength, and complex political machinations in the books, is reduced to a feeble, passive figure who is dispatched in seconds. His entire house is wiped out with barely a whimper, reducing Dorne’s rich history and political independence to a footnote. The logistical nonsense of the Sand Snakes’ travel—simultaneously in Dorne to murder Doran and on Trystane’s ship in King’s Landing—is a glaring continuity error that speaks to a shocking carelessness. It suggests that the writers viewed Dorne not as an integral part of the world, but as a messy plot thread to be severed as quickly and as bloodily as possible, regardless of sense or source fidelity.

The Red Woman serves as a perfect microcosm of Game of Thrones in its sixth season: handsomely produced, occasionally brilliant, but fundamentally unstable. It showcases the show’s enduring ability to deliver powerful character moments and stunning visuals, while simultaneously exposing the hollowness that can creep in when intricate, character-driven plotting is replaced by the necessity to simply "move the pieces" towards a predetermined end. It is the work of capable filmmakers pushing through without their primary navigator, and the strain, even in this ostensibly solid premiere, is already visibly showing.

RATING: 5/10 (++)

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Here is the movie trailer:

All the best.

By: Nattosheru.

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I remember reading a post about Hokum last year and people were going wild for this one with Damian McCarthy directing after hits like Caveat and Oddity, love those too. I was already paying attention to it specially when they trow Adam Scoot into it, but not everything is pink and rainbows on this story, its not bad but its not an 8/10, it drags a lot and the witch didnt generate enough chaos, it was more like a executioner instead of the one harrasing characters. McCarthy has been quietly building this reputation as one of the most interesting directors in Irish horror and Hokum feels like the moment where everything he has been practicing with his smaller work finally clicks into something really sharp and confident. You are immediately dropped into the life of Ohm Bauman, this American novelist played by Scott, who is just about the most unpleasant man you could imagine sharing a hotel lobby with, I hated the guy the moment he start opening his mouth and I mean that as a real compliment to both the writing and the performance. He shows up at this small hotel tucked away somewhere in Ireland, to scatter the ashes of his dead parents near a massive redwood tree in the surrounding woods and from the literal second he steps through the front door he treats every single person around him like they are furniture and like everyone owes him. He will not sign a book for the guy checking him in, he looks over the shoulder at the staff, he drinks heavily and the guy is cold AF when a bellboy named Alby excitedly asks him to look at his manuscript, Ohm heats up a spoon over a candle and burns the poor guy on the hand just to get him to leave. That tells you everything you need to know about who this person is in about 15 minutes flat into the story and the movie earns enormous credit for making you sit with someone this toxic without ever walking away from it, honestly even during the moments it drag I never felt like fast forward or looking at something else, reason why I think its not so bad.

• IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt35672862/
• Platform: PRIME VIDEO

McCarthy is great at is building dread through very specific physical details and practical problem solving and Hokum is probably the cleanest version of that skill he has shown so far. The whole story at the Bilberry Woods Hotel is so well constructed, you have got the wheelchair bound owner Cob who casually mentions he once trapped a witch inside the locked honeymoon suite upstairs, you have got Fergal who is weird and suspicious, and then there is Mal, the front desk clerk who also happens to be Cob son in law so from the start the entire hotel is fishy, also Mal carries this nervous energy. There is also this guy Jerry, living out of a van in the woods and drinking goat milk mix with mushrooms that gets him high as kite wanting to look at his own reflection, but still seems like the only person Ohm treats with a little bit of respect, he is just totally different with this guy than the rest of the guys at the hotel and then the bartender Fiona, who ends up being the moral center of the whole thing because she is the one who actually saves Ohm when things get really dark. When Fiona goes missing around a Halloween party, Ohm feels responsible in a way that clearly cuts through all of this armor he is suppose to wear as protection against the world because thats how I see him, he is hurting and he just push people away to sink into his guilt and watching Adam Scott carry that guilt while also staying completely in character as this prick difficult man is some of the best work he has done. He never softens Ohm into someone easier to root for and yet somehow you are rooting for him anyway, which is not easy to pull off and I think people are going to underrate how good he is in this thing. The honeymoon suite itself is pretty good for a horror location although once he hits te bed everything changes it just becomes another room, rotting and untouched and absolutely disgusting in every corner, the sequence involving a small elevator hidden in the wall, a clock with a mechanical boy swinging a golf club and a very dark basement below is the kind of stuff that makes you lean forward because the movie creates a lot of tension by trying to manage time, the time it took the golf club boy to hit the button.

Now we come to the more realisc part of this blog post because the movie is not perfect and the section right in the middle where Ohm is recovering in the hospital after his lowest point drags hard and takes a lot from how this story started, this moment came out of no where, he decides to take his own life without much explanation, yes the movie shows he is hurting for his mother but at this point the movie has not reveal he was the one who accidentally shot his mom. The subplot involving Jerry and his backstory also gets a little confusing when the movie is trying to juggle it alongside everything else happening at the hotel, because there are a few situations where I lost the thread of what the movie wanted me to feel about him versus what I was actually feeling. The pacing in that part of the movie feels all over the place, like McCarthy knew exactly where he needed the story to go but was not quite sure how long to let certain scenes breathe before getting there, and for a movie that is this tight and controlled, those moments stand out more than they probably would in a messier movie, I mean this movie was very messy in that sense, where we dont know why Ohm hang himself, then was his mother trying to torment him or help him? its like all this questions are getting answer towards the end but at the same time during this moments turn the movie very confusing. The dream sequences involving Ohm traumatic childhood are doing a lot of heavy lifting in terms of explaining who he is and why he is so damaged, and while they are unsettling, especially the part involving this nightmare childrens television character named Jack the Jackass who looks like a very bizzar version of Bugs Bunny, I think one or two of those sequences could have been trimmed and the movie would still stand the same, I really though they were going to give more screen time to Jack considering it was shown through the trailers. The entire time felt like the movie was clearly holding something back for reasons that feel more structural than dramatic, like you can sense the chess pieces being moved rather than just watching things happen, but these are complaints I am making about a movie I enjoy, so take them for what they are worth, if you have gotten to this point you might be asking if I like the movie at all? the answer is yes.

Hokum really remind me of previous movies I have seen from McCarthy, for example Caveat which was an extremely contained physical space and he use it to generate almost unbearable tension through mechanical logic rather than cheap audio tricks. McCarthy is not interested in making you jump by throwing a loud noise at you, I think on Hokum this is very clear during the honeymoon room shots with Ohm, he is interested in making you sweat because you understand exactly how the trap works and you can see every possible way it could go wrong and the elevator sequence is the clearest expression of that. The clock trick, the chalk circle, the sound design as the witch moves through the dark clanking those shackles, all of it is constructed with this almost puzzle like precision that makes the horror feel earned building the atmosphere, its the classic saying of "painting the picture". Compared to Oddity, which I thought had tremendous atmosphere but sometimes let its interesting ideas run a little longer than they needed to not knowing when it was just enough and even felt like going in circles. Hokum is more disciplined and more satisfying as a complete experience if you put the dots together from start to finish, it feels like he learned the right lessons from that movie and applied them here. My biggest complain about the movie is the witch backstory where there is close to none, very little context to the witch story, but I wonder if there is a deeper meaning to it like on other movies, a clear example is Smile where the demon is menthal illness specifically the way Ohm relationship with his own guilt and the ghost of what happened with his parents keeps comming up with those disturbing visions, gives the movie a weight that feels satisfying but you have to think a bit much about it for it to work. That combination of craft and actual feeling is rare and I do not think enough people are going to give this one the credit it deserves.

#hokum, #adamscott, #horror, #movie, #review, #irish, #folklore, #witch, #basement, #mystery, #thriller, #dumbwaiter, #creepy, #inn, #hotel, #haunted, #ghost, #hallucination, #trauma, #grief, #scary, #suspense, #dark, #cinematography, #atmosphere

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In the horror cinema, the problem of resurrecting a seemingly deceased franchise icon is a familiar one. In 1931, Universal’s classic Frankenstein concluded with the Monster apparently perishing in a burning windmill, only for the studio to devise an ingenious—if contrived—escape for his return in 1935’s The Bride of Frankenstein. Two and a half decades later, Britain’s Hammer Film Productions faced a remarkably similar narrative quandary. Their 1957 smash hit, The Curse of Frankenstein had concluded with its ruthlessly ambitious protagonist, Baron Victor Frankenstein (Peter Cushing), awaiting execution for murder, his fantastical tale of creation dismissed as the ravings of a madman. For Hammer, the commercial imperative for a sequel was clear, but the creative challenge was how to plausibly spring the Baron from the guillotine. The resulting film, 1958’s The Revenge of Frankenstein, reuniting Cushing with screenwriter Jimmy Sangster and director Terence Fisher, provides a convenient if not entirely convincing solution, launching a second chapter that is both a testament to Hammer’s burgeoning house style and a film hampered by the rushed circumstances of its production.

The Revenge of Frankenstein opens with titles placing the action in 1860, immediately establishing a curious retcon. Where the first film’s epilogue suggested Frankenstein’s story was disbelieved, here we are told his exploits and the existence of his Monster have become a source of Europe-wide infamy. The Baron’s execution is a public event met with a sigh of relief. Yet, as the blade falls, it is not Frankenstein who is decapitated but a complicit priest (Alex Gallier), in a plan orchestrated by the Baron’s hunchbacked servant, Karl (Oscar Quitak). The escape is executed with a swift, almost perfunctory efficiency that prioritises getting the plot moving over narrative elegance. It is a functional, rather than inspired, piece of screenwriting—a necessary evil to return Cushing’s magnetic villain to the centre of the action.

Having cheated death, Frankenstein resurfaces in the city of Karlsbrück under the alias “Dr. Victor Stein”. He establishes a hugely successful medical practice, cynically catering to the wealthy while operating a free clinic for the poor to cultivate a benevolent reputation. His methods baffle and irritate the local medical council, whose delegation to his hospital includes the young, ambitious Dr. Hans Kleve (Francis Matthews). Kleve alone recognises Stein as the infamous Frankenstein and, in a pivotal scene, reveals himself as a fanatical admirer, begging to become the Baron’s pupil. This dynamic injects a fresh energy into the formula; where Frankenstein previously worked in isolated obsession, he now has a devotee. Together, they embark on a new project: creating a perfect body for Karl, who willingly donates his brain in hopes of a new life. The experiment initially seems a triumph, though an ominous precursor—a chimpanzee subject that, upon revival, cannibalised its mate—hints at latent savagery. The new creature (Michael Gwynn) is a tragic, articulate figure, a far cry from Christopher Lee’s mute, shambling Monster in the first film. However, when a well-meaning but foolish patient, Margaret Conrad (Eunice Gayson), releases him from his restraints, Karl’s idyllic new existence shatters. Confused, rejected, and increasingly violent, he escapes, unleashing a series of incidents that inevitably expose “Dr. Stein’s” true identity.

This plot hinges on a notable, and rather cavalier, disregard for continuity between the two films. As noted, Frankenstein’s tale shifts from being dismissed as lunacy to being accepted as widespread fact. This inconsistency can be directly attributed to the film’s rushed genesis. Producer Michael Carreras allowed Sangster a mere six weeks to deliver the script, a pressure that inevitably forced corners to be cut and logical through-lines to be simplified in favour of expedient set-up.

Despite this foundational wobble, The Revenge of Frankenstein mostly works, thanks largely to the assured hands of its core creative team. Terence Fisher, operating again on a limited budget, directs with a lean, confident efficiency that distinguishes the sequel from its predecessor. He moves the action from a gothic castle to a more urban, clinical environment, reflecting the Baron’s new, more socially integrated guise. The film’s greatest success is Michael Gwynn’s performance as the creature. An experienced stage actor, Gwynn brings a profound pathos and intelligence to the role, making Karl’s tragic fate—his consciousness trapped in a body that becomes a prison of its own—arguably more nuanced and memorable than Lee’s more iconic but less psychologically explored Monster. Fisher also maintains the series’ brief flashes of levity, notably through Lionel Jeffries’ scene-stealing turn as a garrulous, morally flexible gravedigger.

However, not all elements land effectively. The film dabbles in proto-slasher tropes when the disturbed Karl stumbles upon a young couple on a secluded street, resulting in the death of the girl (Avril Leslie). The scene feels tonally jarring, a crude intrusion of sudden violence that clashes with the film’s more measured gothic and tragic tones. Furthermore, the female lead is conspicuously wasted. Eunice Gayson, who would later find fame as James Bond’s first girlfriend, Sylvia Trench, is given the inconsequential role of Margaret Conrad. She serves neither as a romantic interest nor a meaningful damsel in distress; her function is purely plot-catalytic, a device to unleash the monster before receding into the background—a disappointing treatment for a capable actress.

In terms of content, the film’s reputation for causing contemporary critics to call for stricter censorship seems hyperbolic by modern standards. Even for the 1950s, The Revenge of Frankenstein is relatively tame. True to Hammer’s early approach, much of the violence occurs off-screen, and there is very little of the explicit gore that would later define the genre. The horror is more suggested through implication and the chilling amorality of Cushing’s Frankenstein.

Sangster and Fisher salvage a potentially routine monster-on-the-loose narrative with a clever double-twist near the climax. After his patients, enraged by his deception, nearly beat him to death, Frankenstein appears to meet his end. Yet, in a final act of arrogant triumph, it is revealed that Dr. Kleve has saved the Baron’s brain, transplanting it into a new body. The epilogue, set in a London surgery where Kleve assists a “Dr. Frank”, is brilliant. It not only provides a deliciously cynical punchline but also seamlessly bridges the film to future sequels, ensuring the Baron’s—and Hammer’s—line of unholy research could continue indefinitely.

The Revenge of Frankenstein is a sequel of pragmatic ingenuity rather than groundbreaking inspiration. Hamstrung by a rushed script that papers over continuity gaps, it nonetheless succeeds through Fisher’s solid direction, Cushing’s eternally compelling central performance, and a genuinely tragic turn from Michael Gwynn. It consolidates the Hammer formula established in The Curse of Frankenstein: colour, cynicism, and a focus on human evil over supernatural monstrosity. While it stumbles in its handling of female characters and occasional tonal missteps, its effective final twist ensures it remains a compelling and important link in the chain of one of British cinema’s most enduring horror series.

RATING: 5/10 (++)

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After 4 years, following the release of the first season of Blood Sister in 2022, they finally released the second season in 2026. It was pretty interesting with an extension into the life of the two friends turned sisters, Sarah and Kemi. Season 2 focuses on their life in jail following the crime they committed in the first season and the false accusation they have to fight in court from the hands of the Ademolas family. They do not have to face only the consequences of their crime, but they have to struggle with their newfound life in jail with other inmates.

I have to say, if you are probably new to blood sisters, you would get to enjoy it more when you watch both seasons at a stretch, and you do not have to worry much about wondering what happened and who is who? For example, I totally forgot Daniel Effiong was in the first season when I watched the second season. Also, the relevance of some characters in the season left me with some unanswered questions. Was the lawyer also in the first season, or did she come in the second season? I think the lack of a quick recap before the start of season 2 would have been really helpful. Something like what was done with the fourth season of The Witcher when they brought in a new Geralt. Aside from this, the movie was on fire.

I got hooked on the second season right from the first episode because the movie's direction to explore and depict the inner workings of the Nigerian prison. Also, I have to add that they did not hold back in this aspect. They did so much to depict the prison system while doing their best not to invite trouble in their direction. The biggest shock for me was the portrayal of the bathing conditions for the women since it was a women's prison. Nothing will prepare you for what you will see or what will happen next. A good addition to the cast was Blessing and Warripikin because they killed the role they were given. Playing the gang leader in the prison brought a new kind of story to the movie, which made it more interesting and, at the same time, funny to watch. Nobody had an idea these actors were going to be so evil to Sarah and Kemi, the lead characters, hence the blood sisters. Imagine fighting for your life in prison and fighting for your innocence in court. That was the case for Kemi and Sarah.

Acting from Gabriel Afolayan, Kehinde Bankole, and Kate Henshaw gave me a spark, reminding me that the Ademolas are still a dysfunctional family with so many issues to resolve, but at this point in time, it is too late for them. Kate Henshaw remained the matriarch of the Ademola household, calling the shots and making her children's lives a living hell, while keeping Daniel Effiong as her boy toy. With this, you should get a glimpse of how messed up it was for such a family. Lastly, Uche Jumbo gave us a premium acting of what it means to be a mother, with how she went above and beyond for her daughter in this season. Coming from a place of negligence to the issue at hand in the first season, when her daughter complained to her about the kind of family she had gotten into, she became determined to protect her at all costs and make up for her past mistakes. It was a season packed with drama until I did not know it was over.

My Rating: 8/10

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Nordic noir was always destined to be imitated beyond Scandinavia's borders, and Poland—blessed with a sizeable population and thus a substantial domestic market for crime fiction—has emerged as one of the more prolific adopters of the genre. In recent years, the country best known to fantasy enthusiasts as the birthplace of The Witcher has witnessed something of a boom in crime fiction, first in literature and subsequently on screen. Among the televisual offerings is Signs (Znaki), a series that aired on the international AXN network from 2018 and was, until very recently, available on Netflix in its two-season entirety.

The drama unfolds in Sowie Doly, a fictional town nestled in the Owl Mountains—a wooded, remote region of southwestern Poland hard against the Czech frontier. The settlement is sufficiently minuscule that the protagonist, newly appointed police commander Michał Trela (Andrzej Konopka), is forced to lodge as a tenant on the property of Adriana Nieradka (Helena Sujecka), one of his own subordinates. Trela, whose transfer from Kraków was accompanied by whispers of a drink-sodden past, soon discovers that this ostensibly charming, sleepy hamlet conceals a wealth of dark secrets—including an unsolved murder of a young woman committed several years prior.

Trela must contend with a fresh killing in which one of the initial suspects is none other than Błażej Nieradki (Michał Czernecki), Adriana's husband, whom Trela had previously caught in flagrante in an affair with the murder victim. When a second death occurs, Trela realises he may be hunting a serial killer. Complicating matters further is Nina (Magdalena Żak), his adolescent daughter, who befriends Agata (Helena Englert), the "troubled" daughter of Antoni Paszke (Mirosław Kropielnicki), the town mayor. Paszke, meanwhile, is up to his neck in decidedly murky dealings surrounding the construction of a mine financed by shadowy foreign investors.

Signs in its first season gives the distinct impression that its creators prized style over substance, and were not unduly concerned with originality. The fundamental premise owes a conspicuous debt to better-known Anglo-American series such as Twin Peaks and Broadchurch—a debt the writers attempt to obscure with a plethora of subplots that function rather awkwardly, and not always successfully, as some sort of coherent whole. What draws the viewer in far more than the narrative is the skilful deployment of the striking mountain locations, which create a genuinely distinctive atmosphere.

A measure of differentiation from standard police procedurals is provided by the incorporation of Catholic motifs—specifically, religious bigotry—which allows for the construction of several intriguing characters: the leader of a local cult and self-proclaimed healer Jonasz (Andrzej Mastalerz); the young, fanatical policeman Sobczyk (Piotr Trojan); and the newly appointed parish priest Śmigielski (Rafał Cieszyński), who clearly harbours a dark secret from his own past. Though the series is rendered rather convoluted by its numerous subplots and risks baffling its audience, it nevertheless functions—and the lion's share of credit belongs to the cast. Andrzej Konopka proves highly effective as a policeman who, despite manifold flaws, ultimately endeavours to do the right thing. Even more impressive is Helena Sujecka, who may well be the sole normal character in this dysfunctional milieu; she brings considerable realism to the role, deftly balancing feminine vulnerability with a hardy, salt-of-the-earth resilience. The first season might thus scrape a passing grade, despite a predictably irritating cliffhanger.

The second season, however, reveals its authors attempting something "new" and "original"—and, as is so often the case, overreaching considerably. Signs abruptly detaches itself from the "pure" crime genre and ventures into the realm of fantasy, with the screenwriters—having apparently exhausted their exploitation of rural Poland in the late 2010s—plunging deep into the past. Consequently, the series now encompasses Soviets, Nazis, flying saucers, and hints of time travel. All this suggests that fresh inspiration was sought in the German series Dark, yet the result is chaos of an even greater magnitude. The problem extends beyond content to form: a new subplot involves the hunt for lost treasure conducted by the young historian Eliza Konieczna (Ewa Jakubowicz), presented through flashbacks and non-linear narration that grows increasingly irksome, and ultimately utterly bewildering. The anticipated multiple cliffhanger at the season's end represents the very embodiment of melodramatic cliché, as well as the creators' inability to offer viewers anything coherent.

The second season thus comprehensively spoils the impression of the series; should the makers wish to salvage its reputation, they shall need to produce something of quite extraordinary quality in a third season—should such a season ever be commissioned.

RATING: 3/10 (+)

(Note: The text in the original Croatian version is available here.)

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Deadwood is one of those shows that a lot of people will tell you is absolutely amazing and one of those "must watch" sorts of things. I have tried in the past on several occasions to get into it and failed. I have at one point or another owned a DVD set of the first season and it appealed to me so little that I don't even know what happened to them. I must have loaned them out to someone else and then forgot about them and I wasn't concerned enough about it to figure out where they went.

Whoever borrowed those from me and didn't return them, I hope you enjoyed it a great deal more than I did. Or maybe you ended up feeling the same way I did about it and that's why you too, probably forgot you even had them.

Who knows.

I started to watch this again because it has been on my group's server for quite some time and I am now at a point where I'm not really digging any of the new series and I am mostly watching Deadwood before I get back into House of the Dragon to refresh my memory before the new season drops later this month.

Let's dig into what I think Deadwood kind of suffers from, and how I think I will most likely fail yet again at trying to watch it this time around as well.

It's hard to imagine this and it makes me feel old but this much lauded series is more than 20 years old. Westerns are a tough sell in the entertainment marketplace but they managed to do so with this one and they probably ended up winning some awards because of it.

Deadwood is set in the 1870's in South Dakota before the area had truly been governed. The area is presented as being rather lawless and there are no authority figures that are officials of the USA at the time. Society is run by whoever has the guts to try to rule and while it is a work of fiction, it is meant to be based at least to some degree on actual happenings during that time. I'm not going to look into the authenticity of these claims.

[src](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Deadwood_a_l.jpg?w=1440&h=810&crop=1)

Even if you haven't seen the show you probably recognize Ian McShane as one of the main characters. He is presented very early on as being a corrupt and rather evil leader of Deadwood, Al Swearengen. This much I know is true in that Al was a real person and was notorious for being cutthroat and business savvy. He keeps his friends close and his enemies closer and has his dirty little fingers in a lot of dirty pies. He will lie, cheat, steal, and murder his way to keeping his power and mostly he is quite reviled yet respected and feared by the residents of Deadwood.

Much of what I have seen and can remember about having watched this show in the past revolves around him. Other characters come and go and there are some real historical figures that pop in that most people would at least recognize the names of such as Wild Bill Hickock and Wyatt Earp. The writers took a lot of liberty in writing their involvement in the city and it is understandable why they would have to do that because there isn't going to be a lot of records about a city that wasn't even governed for a long time.

But let's get into what I like about this series and what I do not like.

Pro: Beautiful and authentic looking sets

[src](https://stinkyipod.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/222225_9193257254_943_n.jpg)

Rebuilding a city based on a couple of very blurry photographs and really old drawings of a city that had no law can't be easy and now you have to do it while attempting to make it look authentic to the time period in question all while doing so with modern actual equipment. This is a very tough thing to do in movies or shows and I have first-hand experience in how hard this can be and how there is a relative army of people that work only on ensuring that there are no accidental modern things like wrist-watches or Starbucks cups in any scene.

I actively search for things like this but even when you check exhaustive lists online there are not many mistakes the likes of how there is an airplane flying overhead in Troy and the famous Starbucks coffee cup that appears in Game of Thrones.

The dusty and old timey feel of the show is really well done and I would imagine that there was plenty of complaining going on by the people that were involved in the making of this series. I'll give credit where it is due and they did a fantastic job of this.

Con: The story moves alarmingly slow

[src](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2016/01/09/arts/deadwood/deadwood-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)

Shows can all be shootouts and explosions, this much I know. But in the case of Deadwood the first 4 episodes almost nothing happens at all. I have been told by people that love the show that you have to endure this, but then things get a lot better with plenty of surprises mixed in if you can tough it out until later. I'm currently really struggling to make this happen because I know that the slew of characters are so widespread that just a little bit of Instagramming while it is on is going to result in me missing some very crucial information that will be very important later on.

I seriously struggle to say focused while watching this show and have to find other things to do in the same room like laundry or doing some sit ups or something like that to pass the time. Each episode is about an hour and multiple times I have pushed the button to see how much time is left and honestly, I sometimes just wish they would fucking get on with it already.

There's 12 episode in each of the 3 seasons as well as a film that I have also not seen. I am very hopeful that it will "pick up" soon and I am reminded how I initially gave up on Game of Thrones for the same reason but a friend basically begged me to continue. It now is one of my favorite series of all time so I am hopeful that Deadwood can somehow end up being the same.

Con: Super long intro

This intro has a nice song, and I enjoyed it the first 2 or 3 times I saw it but at nearly 2 minutes long I feel as though this really shouldn't have been that way. This is a true sign of the times though because it seems to me that only recently did people start to get so impatient. Perhaps a 2 minute intro was just normal back then, or a super long one, like this, was a sign of how great the production actually was.

For me, the intro of Breaking Bad kind of flipped everything because that intro was just a few seconds long and to me, that was perfect.

My setup doesn't allow me to automatically skip an intro so I often have to just guess whether or not I skipped too much. Deadwood's first couple of minutes of every episode thus far has just been establishing shots, so up to now my trigger happy skipping of many minutes hasn't resulted in me ruining any crucial moments of the show, and this is probably just lucky.

Pro: Very good actors

[src](https://beam-images.warnermediacdn.com/2025-07/wild-bill-hickok-1920.jpg?host=wbd-dotcom-drupal-prd-us-east-1.s3.amazonaws.com)

There are so many good actors in this show that no matter who they are focusing on, they are probably going to be putting on a very high level of performance. There are a few exceptions such as "Calamity Jane" but her being annoying might have been intentional and actress Robin Weigert may have done such a good job that we were maybe meant to be annoyed by her.

I mistakenly thought that the actor playing Wild Bill Hickok was Hugh Laurie from House but it is actually someone named Keith Carradine, who I am actually not very familiar with.

Anyway, this series doesn't suffer from any bad acting. They absolutely nailed that side of things, even with the few child actors and that is something I am normally very picky about.

I am not one to really tolerate stories that move exceptionally slow. I will admit that much like almost anyone else on planet Earth, the availability of internet all over the place has kind of drastically reduced my attention span.

I'm going to stick this one out at least for the first season though. Finally something really interesting happened with the death of a character that they had set up as being central and it kind of reminded me of when they offed Ned Stark in the first season of Game of Thrones. I had not read the book at that point in my life yet, so that really caught me off guard. The fact that they would do this so early on in Deadwood has me believing that there could be some wonderfully unpredictable things to come. For that reason alone, I am going to keep going even though at least at 5 episodes in, I feel as though it is quite an accomplishment to just pay attention for an hour in a row.

If you have watched Deadwood and enjoyed it, let me know in the comments below!

Form and Void (S1x08)

Airdate: 9 March 2014

Written by: Nic Pizzolatto Directed by: Cary Jo Fukunaga

Running Time: 54 minutes

The eighth episode of HBO's True Detective will leave many viewers feeling rather dissatisfied—though not, perhaps, for the reasons one might expect. The majority shall simply be displeased that it has ended at all; the next twelve months shall see them endure the pangs of withdrawal until the network releases the announced second season with its entirely new plot, characters, and cast. A smaller contingent shall grumble that the season comprised a mere eight episodes, with the unfortunate consequence that many questions raised throughout the series remain less than perfectly answered, and that the promised "epic" conclusion appeared somewhat rushed. And naturally, there shall be those most aggrieved that their painstakingly constructed theories—so diligently researched and eloquently argued across the Internet—have now been rendered utterly irrelevant.

Writer Nic Pizzolato, however, remained faithful to his assurances that he would not gratuitously "season" his work with supernatural elements or contrived "unexpected" plot twists. The first season—and the investigation pursued by our two protagonists—concludes precisely as Hollywood convention dictates: with the unmasking and elimination of a monstrous murderer, executed in the most dramatically satisfying manner possible. Pizzolato, alongside director Cary Joji Fukunaga, rather skilfully recycles the action of the fifth episode, which apparently was intended to resolve the case and conclude the series. Yet one protagonist—or to be precise, a single protagonist—fatally "mucked things up" on that occasion, and is now compelled, alongside his companion but burdened with excess kilograms and lacking police credentials, to sit a remedial examination of sorts. Cohle and Hart are once again forced to operate as freelancers, mounting a raid upon an isolated property in the back of beyond where a depraved and violent enemy awaits, enjoying all the advantages of home turf. Unlike that similar operation in 1995, viewers are not afforded the luxury of hearing about this assault through the protagonists' retrospective narration; consequently, we are left uncertain whether either man shall escape with his life. It is precisely this uncertainty that provides the episode's greatest tension—not cheap gimmicks such as body counts, explosions, or physical altercations.

The matter that most occupied the series' devotees—the identity of the killer—was already resolved in the previous instalment, meaning the opening of episode eight, which depicts his quotidian existence, initially appears rather superfluous. Indeed, this may represent the series' weakest segment, given that the character portrayed by Glenn Fleschler seems somewhat overloaded with serial killer clichés. To many, he shall appear an almost parodic combination of Buffalo Bill from The Silence of the Lambs and Norman Bates from Psycho, not to mention his daily practice of incest. At this juncture, True Detective perhaps does not cross the threshold into exploitative "trash," but it certainly positions itself uncomfortably close to it.

Those most disappointed by True Detective, however, shall be those who—perhaps precisely because the series led its protagonists and audience into the "heart of darkness"—expected it to conclude in that very same stygian place. The final confrontation unfolds within the semi-mythical "Carcosa," which proves as dark and terrifying a location as many had imagined, yet simultaneously appears rather banal and realistic. Pizzolato, however, declines to subject his audience to the sort of shock that Se7en delivered two decades prior. Some might argue he does so at the cost of the finale occasionally resembling a deus ex machina—though everything might have appeared rather more polished had the episode run some ten minutes longer, allowing for scenes that would clarify certain details.

This approach, conversely, permits some of the "strongest" scenes—those allowing the cast to demonstrate their considerable talents once more—to be presented within an unusually lengthy epilogue for this genre. Within these sequences, the characters finally confront the emotional and other consequences of their actions, experiencing something approximating "catharsis"—a sort of enlightenment after which they shall view their lives and the universe in an entirely different manner. These scenes may not align in tone or philosophy with the preceding episodes, yet they feel like something the protagonists—and the viewers who patiently sat before their screens for two months—richly deserved.

RATING: 8/10 (+++)

(Note: The text in the original Croatian version is available here.)

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