Worrying less about doing good in the “right” way and being more focused on just doing good is the textbook definition of Neutral Good.
I’ve been annoyed with several aspects.
Frances McDorman’s narration is fine, but in several spots she pronounces things in a more British way. I can’t recall any specific examples. Her parents were Canadian, but she was born and raised in the US, so it’s a puzzlement.
Mrs. Downing in labor also annoyed me with a Britishism. Her husband was meeting with the President, and she shrieks “You’re MEANT TO BE HERE WITH ME!!!”. An American would have said “supposed to”, not “meant to”.
I’m only up to episode 4, so I can’t tell if it gets much better, but Adam comes off as reading from a script, versus actually being Adam. His voice has almost no inflection, even when he’s supposed to be excited.
Death’s voice… no. Just no. A gruff, angry-sounding man. Should have been deep, reverberating - maybe like he was speaking from inside a metal chamber or something.
Tennant and Sheen together as Crowley and Azirophale, though… hooooooboy, they NAILED it. Possibly the most perfect casting I’ve ever seen.
I love how that was handled in this. It was never referred to, but almost every time Crowley was driving Queen was on the radio.
And in Episode 4 or 5, we see him put in a Mozart CD and have nice classical music start playing. Only to have a CUT to further down the road, and some Queen blaring instead. It made me laugh out loud!
I purposely didn’t re-read the book ahead of time either (which worked out since I can’t find my copy), and I was very happy with the adaptation. Props to everyone involved.
And did anyone else get the feeling there was a mild set up for a second season/series of it? Maybe based on some of Gaiman/Pratchett’s un-finished ideas for the sequel?
Not really, and I follow Gaiman on Twitter where he has repeatedly stated that this is just the one adaptation and no follow up coming.
Neil is being coy. He has also stated in interviews that there was substantial material from a sequel and some of it got folded into this adaptation. I’m quite sure that if Amazon waves enough money at him, he’ll get to writing a sequel most riki-tik.
Speaking of Americanisms/Britishisms said by the wrong nationality character, the whole “miles per hour” thing took me out of it for a solid 30 seconds.
I forget the episode, but Crowley is driving and A says something about going 90 miles an hour, which pulled me out of the show for a bit because I was unaware (until googling just now) that Britain actually uses miles per hour, not kilometers. Learned my something new for the day!
Not necessarily, since she’s been living in the UK. People “catch” accents and expressions. I had an American accent before I ever lived in the US, of course even more of it after living there; after two years in Scotland, now I sound American to the Scottish, Scottish to the Americans, and “where is that accent from? You don’t sound Spanish” to other people.
Yes, Britain is weird like this - distance is measured in kilometres but speed in MPH.
Just finished watching the series. Overall: I found it quite entertaining.
My cousin who is a fan of the book was disappointed in the series. I’m glad I didn’t read the book first.
Specific thoughts:
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The imagery and style of this show was just fantastic and very engaging and entertaining. Loved the opening sequence, and the bookshop, especially. But everything looked great.
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I love both Michael Sheen and David Tennant and they delivered engaging performances. Tennant looked like a rock star. Is he really as skinny as Mick Jagger? However, I find myself wishing again that they would be allowed to use their natural Welsh and Scottish accents (respectively). I love their natural voices and rarely get to hear them. (Tennant does his own Scottish as the narrator of “Twenty Twelve” and "W1A.)
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What the heck accent was Michael McKean supposed to be doing? It sounded like some random combination of accents, mostly Scottish and Northern England. Is it a recognizably real accent?
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Soo many great cast choices–Jon Hamm, Frances McDormand, Jack Whitehall, Miranda Richardson, Nick Offerman, Josie Lawrence, Derek Jacobi … But I was not so crazy about the actor who played Adam Young–not even as good as the other child actors in the scenes with him. And what a wast of a Brian Cox. That could have been anyone with that costume and voice. Also, I didn’t recognize Benedict Cumberbatch.
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Overall, the plot was predictably “clever.” It was okay, not mind-blowing. Few surprises. Predictably Douglas-Adamsish irony-based humor. The end twist catch me off guard though. It seemed like a good setup for a sequel if the demon and the angel had switched sides. But the switch was a good ending.
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I appreciate the brevity of six episodes.
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Nice Easter egg of the guard (with the noticeably fake American accent) reading “American Gods” at his post.
Yes, beginning as “Crawly,” pronounced like “crawl” (-y) and changed to “Crowley,” pronounced like “crow” (-ly), the bird. Had I read the book, I probably would have thought of “Crowley” as being pronounced like “now” or “wow” (-ly).
It helps if you’ve read the description in the book:
I think McKean was going with “deranged, vaguely Scottish Speaker’s Corner orator” for the most part, but weirdly I think he ended up as close to the book description one can get without going over-the-top about it.
That’s pretty impressive then.
Mrs Magill and I finished it up last night. We both enjoyed it immensely. A couple of observations:
[ul]
[li]After hearing Christopher Lee as Death, not even the great Brian Cox can compare.[/li][li]I missed the Additional Horsemen of the Apocalypse, but they would have broken the flow leading up to the climax.[/li][li]I bet Hastor does smell like poo.[/li][li]Holy Moley - Michael Sheen. This is probably the first time a twist had been spoiled for me by an actor doing a phenomenal job. Sheen was Crowley imitating Aziraphale.[/li][/ul]
What books are in the shop when it is resurrected? The ones that Aziraphale says “Those are new”?
They are the “William” series by Richmal Crompton which was apparently an inspiration for this story.
thank you!
Not necessarily, since the US has a bunch of accents. I noticed it, but wasn’t bothered as I would’ve probably have said the same. In my head a heavily emphasized “MEANT” said with a lofty scrinch of the nose brings with it images of things more important than mere politics, like wedding vows. YMMV
Yes.
Squatney.
Me to the missus: “He walks like Jim Morrison making fun of Mick Jagger.”
Excellent!
I’m sorry to barge in and being contrarian to this love fest, but I turned it off halfway through episode one, as I did with American Gods.
And I’m on my second copy of Good Omens, having read and re-read it so many times.
I’m not going to list all my gripes*, because that would bring this close to a thread shit, but I really, really think Gaiman should have been kept away from any part of the production, as he should’ve been with AG. He’s too close to the source material and even though I think he’s a fantastic writer, as for screen writing, not so much.
The series is way too close to the book and that hampers it in a serious way.
- Apart from this: I love Tennant, but when I saw the first stills from production, I knew we were going to be treated to some serious scenery chewing. Crowley is much, much more subtle than what Tennant brought to the table. Again, I blame Gaiman, as Tennant can do subtle