The End Of The F***ing World Review

| January 5, 2018 |

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Between its punk championship and an opening few minutes that reference child self-mutilation, brute killing, psychopathy and murder, The End Of The F***ing World starts off by weeding out the weak. Meet teenagers James and Alyssa, it says, he'south a monster and she's angry. You lot won't similar them.

You will though, yous'll even come to love them. Just as the spikiest people can exist the about vulnerable, this prove's aggressive nihilism conceals a tender and romantic centre. Its viii episodes are essentially the story of two young people damaged by abandonment who detect temporary solace in each other. With a bit of murder.

Seventeen-year-old James has a plan. Testing out his self-diagnosed status as a psychopath, he wants to graduate from killing pets to murdering humans. Enter, Alyssa. "She'd started that term, says James' voiceover. "I idea she could be interesting to impale."

When Alyssa proposes that the pair of them escape from their "bullshit" suburban lives, James goes along with it. ("Showing willing was the all-time approach with Alyssa."). By the end of episode 1, they're driving off in a stolen auto with Alyssa defiantly declaring herself not scared. "She probably should have been" says James.

It'southward a neat cliff-hanger, the first of many in the bear witness's tightly plotted eight episodes. The whole series will be available to stream on Netflix in the U.Southward. (it premiered on Aqueduct 4 in the U.K.) starting Jan fifth.

This Channel 4/Netflix co-production is the second time director Jonathan Entwistle has brought Charles Forsman's 2013 graphic novel to screens. In 2014, Entwistle made short film TWOTFW starring Submarine 's Craig Roberts and Tamara Drewe 'southward Jessica Barden as James and Alyssa. That was the kickoff footstep to this series, which adds Lucy Tcherniak equally 2nd block director and author-actor Charlie Covell on adaptation duties.

Barden is back for the series, with Blackness Mirror 's Alex Lawther every bit James. Yet strong the original pairing may accept been, it's difficult to imagine these ii beingness bettered. Barden is luminously good—funny, aggressive, middle-breaking—while Lawther pulls off a combination of dangerous and sympathetic then convincing information technology'due south like an optical illusion. One minute, James seems irrevocably damaged, and then blink, and he'southward a kid in pain. It'southward a transformation both leads are able to pull off, and information technology gives this darkly comic story real emotional weight.

The emotional side is meticulously handled, never compromising its cool tone or threatening to turn into mawkishness. Sentimentality is repeatedly undercut with a gag. The adolescent vocalization also opens the door to expression that seems naïve but is satisfying and meaningful. ("Sometimes you lot realize yous've had a thing keeping you going that might be a lie. When you actually really empathize that, that the whole thing might take been a lie the whole time, it's like you swallowed a stone, but, not recently. You swallowed it years agone.")

James' laconic voiceover is comically understated. "Things didn't always get entirely to plan on my journey with Alyssa" he says, faced with their latest disaster. Beautiful understatement is this show's mode (a character who took their own life is described equally having "just always plant everything a scrap much, I recollect"). It moves from entertainingly caustic to movingly abstracted, and James and Alyssa's voiceovers are used to excellent consequence. ("Alyssa was kind of a nymphomaniac", says James, deadpan, later she awkwardly places her hand on his leg).

Likewise equally the script, the label is worthy of praise. James and Alyssa's depth and progression announce themselves gently through their macabre adventure. At a crucial betoken, Alyssa's abrasive persona merges with her internal vocalization – "I'm really scared" she says both in her head and out loud, a pregnant change from the disconnect betwixt what she comedically thought and said in the early episodes.

Even the minor characters have an arc. We run across Alyssa's mother only briefly, just her scenes carry a sense of her conflict and history, as does Steve Oram's cheerful/tragic role every bit James' dad. Gemma Whelan's police force detective Eunice Noon is introduced as comic relief, but goes on to make some realizations well-nigh her personal life, while a mother who makes an unsavoury discovery virtually her son has a whole conflict-based progression despite having only a scattering of lines. The overall sense is of forward propulsion, with all elements moving towards the cease, and no storytelling slack in sight.

The episodes are curt, around 20 minutes a pop, and they whirl past in a flash. Like slices of perfect pop, nothing outstays its welcome. The whole story takes identify over v or half-dozen days, with events sometimes rewinding and playing out from both Alyssa's and James' perspective. Their journey features a serial of encounters with some great comedy cameos. Matt Male monarch, Felicity Montagu, Barry Ward, Geoff Bell, Wunmi Mosaku… Earl Cave is terrific in his brief appearance as a petrol station attendant who's inspired to revolution by the bohemian pair.

Looks-wise, it's a cine-literate adaptation that transforms rural England (specifically Kent'south Island of Sheppey in its later episodes) into the plains and highways of America. The whole thing is starry-eyed about the States ("If this was a film, we'd probably be American," observes Alyssa wryly at one point). The young leads consume exclusively at US-style diners and drink at a red-neck roadside bar, driving through broad, empty landscapes and isolated strips of route. The feel is a bit Badlands , a bit True Romance , a bit Pulp Fiction . That's helped along by James and Alyssa'due south mid-series costume-change, which seems to reference those picture's duos – Clarence and Alabama, Pumpkin and Honey Bunny, Kit and Holly.

Most of all though, information technology's the music that carries the those references through. From dreamy fifties beloved songs to crooning land— Lonesome Town , used in Lurid Fiction, makes one appearance—the songs transport it over the Atlantic and back in time. The soundtrack past Blur'southward Graham Coxon, is terrific and merits its own release.

The Cease Of The F***ing Earth might be referential, simply it isn't glib. It borrows style ideas, just has plenty of its own to add. As a TV serial, it'south a great lookout man, and as a calling menu for fresh talent, information technology's outstanding – acerbic, tender-hearted and fearless.

This review originally ran onDen of Geek Uk.