I loved the book and am really looking forward to the miniseries.
Earlier thread about casting and pre-production: Who would you cast in Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell? - Cafe Society - Straight Dope Message Board
Website: http://www.bbcamerica.com/jonathan-strange-and-mr-norrell/
Wiki article: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (TV series) - Wikipedia
Freely comment in this thread on any episode once it has aired in the U.S. Please put book info in spoiler boxes.
And we’re off…!
OK, I’ve seen it, and liked it a lot.
The characters aren’t quite as I envisioned them (Norrell should be thinner and Strange not quite as foppish in my mind’s eye), but the actors did well in the roles. Vinculus was spot on. Drawlight was also good (and I liked how he kept mispronouncing his “dear friend” Norrell’s name). Not sure yet of the Gentleman with Thistle-down Hair. Sfx weren’t bad - York and London both looked pretty good for the era.
Favorite lines:
Norrell: “Nothing could please me more” than letting the two visitors check out his library, when obviously he wants them instantly gone.
Strange to his beloved Arabella: “I’m not drinking much at all now - scarcely more than a bottle a day.”
I noticed that the paper which Childermass reads is The Thames, not The Times.
Strange’s expression of smug satisfaction as he stood over his awful father’s grave, and as he walked away, was priceless.
Was this different from the book?
I don’t recall Childermass and Vinculus playing at tarot cards. But it was a clever effect to have the Raven King’s sigil get bigger and more distinct on each successive card of The Emperor.
Yes, your spoiler did occur in the book.
We’ve just seen episode 5 over here and it is excellent. Indeed I’d say you liked the opening episode more than I did, which I found a bit ponderous at times. It really picks up for me when Strange starts to come into his own.
Most of the comments say that it gets better after the first episode, which is the only thing that makes me want to watch another. Atmospheric stories are better as books.
I enjoyed it as did my kids. I am looking forward to the second ep.
It certainly does pick up a lot. Much of the focus is on Jonathan Strange at the moment, but they’re developing the other characters quite well.
I finished the first episode last night. I really enjoyed it. My biggest complaint has nothing to do with the show. My provider only has BBCA on SD, so I had to blow up the picture, which made it not as clear as I’d like. Which leads to my question.
Was that Mr. Norrell that Jonathan saw in the mirror? That’s whom I was expecting, but he didn’t quite look like Mr Norrell. It could have been the poor picture quality, though.
Yes, it was Norrell, seen from behind and to the left as he was reading. He glanced back a little once, but never looked directly into the camera, er, mirror.
Forgot to mention, I laughed when Honeyfoot and Segundus are in the carriage, riding out to see Norrell. Honeyfoot muses that he and Segundus could become great magicians together: “‘John Segundus and Mr. Honeyfoot.’ It sounds well.” Of course, we all know what the title of the show really is…
I knew nothing about the books when I watched the first episode. I didn’t know if the target audience was supposed to be young or what, but I thought it was a dud and turned it off after the first hour.
There was no sense of mystery to it. There was no sense of man having to sacrifice his soul and sanity to learn the arcane arts. It basically begins with some guy wandering around asking people why magic is no longer practiced in what looks to be 18th-century England. Isn’t there a pervading religious aversion to it? Doesn’t asking such questions get one labeled as a heretic, or at least somebody to lock up and force-feed Bible verses?
He finds a Society of Magic, and it turns out they don’t actually practice magic, they just like to talk about it. They don’t actually believe in it. They’re just foppish skeptics. Then out of nowhere, there’s somebody who says he can prove magic exists, and arranges for them to occupy a room with talking statues. Talking statues? There was little to no foreshadowing of what the magician went through to perform this demonstration. No rituals? No studying of arcane texts? No scenes of him going to the location beforehand and doing something to awaken the statues?
Meanwhile, there’s a trope of the crazy old guy who knows everything but nobody understands his cryptic ramblings, and he dismisses them as too stupid to understand anyway. Then there’s a crazy young guy who nobody can stand because he’s so obnoxious. It just seems like the show wanted to throw the crazy at the viewer and not bother with buildup or character development. Don’t worry about personality, just give them some crazy lines and cool-looking magic stuff and the rest will take care of itself. All flash and no substance.
Check the On Demand service, if your cable or satellite provider has one. My cable company had BBC America on standard definition only up until a few years ago. But then I discovered that some programs (Doctor Who, perhaps?) were available in HD via the On Demand service.
The setting is early 19th century England. Not every detail is shown; perhaps there will be further explanations later. Perhaps not.
I loved the book but think I’d enjoy the show if I hadn’t read it. Because this is the sort of thing I like. (Not the only sort of thing–I’ve enjoyed witty comic book superheroes, moody midcentury ad men & the eloquently obscene inhabitants of a South Dakota mining town.)
It’s just not the sort of thing that* you* like.
The show did a terrible job of making clear that this was an alternate world England. In this England, magic is real and was as major a part of history as the Magna Carta and the Spanish Armada. But magic was extremely deadly, with evil creatures like fairies and the Raven King loose in the world, and they really don’t want those times back. It’s become an affectation. Studying magic is now a gentleman’s profession, the way being a natural philosopher was in early 19th century Britain in our world.
Magic just is, a matter of having the proper aptitude and knowing the correct spells. Why does anyone has to sacrifice his soul and sanity? Sounds like you’ve been reading fiction about magic. Why does it have to work that way in this world? Jonathan Strange is not Dr. Strange.
They obviously have a different tailor.
I really enjoyed this first episode! I started re-reading the book last night.
Though the casting differed greatly from my reader’s imagination (doesn’t it always?), I loved the choices. The actor I always refer to as “the dweeby boyfriend in *Vera Drake *and scary driver ed instructor in Happy Go Lucky” is an excellent choice to play Norrell.
The book portrays Drawlight as a small, dark person; but I like him as a fat and fabulous – reminds me of Cameron on Modern Family.
I like it pretty well, so far. My only disappointment is the Gentleman with the Thistledown Hair, who instead of being otherworldly, ethereal and charmingly malevolent is just, …creepy.
I think of him as “Lestrade from the Robert Downey Sherlock Holmes movies, and the top bank robber from Hancock.”
http://www.gonemovies.com/WWW/Pictures/Pictures/Hancock10.jpg
I still wonder what Benedict Cumberbatch would have done with the role…
Yeah, that would’ve been something.