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Back to Neverwhere. I've been missing it. Episode five is an odd bunny, though. By now the intros to each episode are starting to feel a little clunky; a little too stylised, especially with the mixture of normal action and freeze-frame. Recaps are always annoying when you've watched something all the way through anyway, and trying to make them extra odd doesn't change that. I do like the shifting map of the Underground that's used as a backdrop, though.
The theme music is very effective. Not sure I've mentioned it before (checking would take valuable energy), but it has an otherworldly, dream-like edge to it; and the pictures accompanying it are good, too. Again there is an air of being a little too stylised; a little too wilfully odd; but it works in the theme music. It's scene-setting, after all.
Episode five begins with Croup and Vandemar, whose dialogue gets progressively better with each appearance, dumping the Marquis's body in the sewers. He gets scavenged almost immediately, and Old Bailey, the pigeon feller from earlier in the series, buys him at the market. This is where The Silver Box Of Great Plot Importance from episode one comes into being. It contains the Marquis's life, and with some noisy SFX and a lot of croaking, the Swaggering One is awake again, with a slit throat and some uncomfortable answers to show for his little adventure. That is one hell of a way to go on an information-hunting expedition. Meanwhile Door and her band of the wet and the annoying progress on their journey to take the key to the Angel Islington, accompanied now by a vampire with designs on Richard. Poor Richard who, after briefly being the hero in episode four, and winning the key from the Blackfriars, is now reduced to being a hopeless wimp again, and squeaking morosely at everything that happens. On the plus side, Hunter the bodyguard, who has been overly arch and annoying throughout, turns out to be a traitor. So it's okay to dislike her now. There's a nice flurry of activity as the Marquis turns up just in time to save Richard from the vampire, followed by Hunter delivering Door into the hands of Croup and Vandemar. And their dialogue is still getting better with every appearance. I love Croup and Vandemar. They're cruel and nasty and vicious and evil and cruel and nasty. And very funny. Also, they beat up Richard, and quite frankly by this point he deserves it.
And on to episode six, with the Angel Islington no longer bothering to appear nice, and instead wandering around his room of candles in his dazzlingly white robe, plotting an invasion of heaven, and generally being a git. He's a jolly good git. The Marquis points out to a confused Richard that Lucifer was also an angel, only to get a lovely tirade about Lucifer being generally rubbish. Islington isn't just evil, he's evil with an almighty chip on his shoulder. Evil chips. Hmm. I'm jumping the gun a little though, as the Marquis and Richard take a while yet to get to the Angel Islington. First they have to do battle with a Highland cow. Hunter has been building up the role of the legendary Beast Of London Below all along - lots of stuff about its hide bristling with the spears of fallen warriors. There's no escaping, though, the fact that it's really just a Highland cow. Not an especially big one, either. Still, on the plus side, it kills Hunter, before falling to some rather unlikely spear thrusts from Richard. If it was that easy to kill the thing, you'd think somebody else would have managed it first. Anyway, yadda yadda, Angel Islington, plans to invade heaven, Door tricks him with a fake key, and bye bye Angel into an abyss. Croup falls in as well, and Vandemar apparently decides that he'd rather go along too. Which is a nice display of solidarity. Very thoughtful of the Angel to chain the heroes up, so that they don't also get sucked into the void, I always feel. Visually it's a very nice conclusion to the adventure, but it does feel a little rushed. Yet again I'm left wishing that the series was longer. Six hour long episodes would be so much better than six of thirty minutes.
Everything screams sequel at this point. The Angel shouts that Door's sister is still alive, as he gets sucked off into nothingness. Croup and Vandemar will clearly be back, because they're Croup and Vandemar. Richard leaves London Below to go home, after first being dubbed Sir Richard Of Maybury, Warrior of London Below, by the Earl of Earl's Court; only to decide that what he really wants is a life underground being weird. And who wouldn't decide that, frankly. Up pops the Marquis to take him back down, and off we go into Neverwhere II. Except that we don't, because they never made it. And Neil Gaiman, after twelve odd years of hinting, still hasn't written it.
Git.
One dead Marquis, and...
... one not-quite-so-dead Marquis. Hurrah!
Richard meets a vampire in the queue for a take-out curry. As you do.
Vampired, London Below style.
Croup and Vandemar steal away with Door.
The Mystical Highland Cow Of London Below.
Just the Marquis being cool, really.
The Marquis confronts the Angel.
An oddly pleasing sentence, and a very pleasing scene.
Not a nice and fluffy angel.
Goodbye Islington.
Oddly, Richard's old life can't compare to the new one...
... so he summons the De Carabas Taxi Cab Service, and heads off back into London Below.
In wait of a sequel.
Hint hint.
The theme music is very effective. Not sure I've mentioned it before (checking would take valuable energy), but it has an otherworldly, dream-like edge to it; and the pictures accompanying it are good, too. Again there is an air of being a little too stylised; a little too wilfully odd; but it works in the theme music. It's scene-setting, after all.
Episode five begins with Croup and Vandemar, whose dialogue gets progressively better with each appearance, dumping the Marquis's body in the sewers. He gets scavenged almost immediately, and Old Bailey, the pigeon feller from earlier in the series, buys him at the market. This is where The Silver Box Of Great Plot Importance from episode one comes into being. It contains the Marquis's life, and with some noisy SFX and a lot of croaking, the Swaggering One is awake again, with a slit throat and some uncomfortable answers to show for his little adventure. That is one hell of a way to go on an information-hunting expedition. Meanwhile Door and her band of the wet and the annoying progress on their journey to take the key to the Angel Islington, accompanied now by a vampire with designs on Richard. Poor Richard who, after briefly being the hero in episode four, and winning the key from the Blackfriars, is now reduced to being a hopeless wimp again, and squeaking morosely at everything that happens. On the plus side, Hunter the bodyguard, who has been overly arch and annoying throughout, turns out to be a traitor. So it's okay to dislike her now. There's a nice flurry of activity as the Marquis turns up just in time to save Richard from the vampire, followed by Hunter delivering Door into the hands of Croup and Vandemar. And their dialogue is still getting better with every appearance. I love Croup and Vandemar. They're cruel and nasty and vicious and evil and cruel and nasty. And very funny. Also, they beat up Richard, and quite frankly by this point he deserves it.
And on to episode six, with the Angel Islington no longer bothering to appear nice, and instead wandering around his room of candles in his dazzlingly white robe, plotting an invasion of heaven, and generally being a git. He's a jolly good git. The Marquis points out to a confused Richard that Lucifer was also an angel, only to get a lovely tirade about Lucifer being generally rubbish. Islington isn't just evil, he's evil with an almighty chip on his shoulder. Evil chips. Hmm. I'm jumping the gun a little though, as the Marquis and Richard take a while yet to get to the Angel Islington. First they have to do battle with a Highland cow. Hunter has been building up the role of the legendary Beast Of London Below all along - lots of stuff about its hide bristling with the spears of fallen warriors. There's no escaping, though, the fact that it's really just a Highland cow. Not an especially big one, either. Still, on the plus side, it kills Hunter, before falling to some rather unlikely spear thrusts from Richard. If it was that easy to kill the thing, you'd think somebody else would have managed it first. Anyway, yadda yadda, Angel Islington, plans to invade heaven, Door tricks him with a fake key, and bye bye Angel into an abyss. Croup falls in as well, and Vandemar apparently decides that he'd rather go along too. Which is a nice display of solidarity. Very thoughtful of the Angel to chain the heroes up, so that they don't also get sucked into the void, I always feel. Visually it's a very nice conclusion to the adventure, but it does feel a little rushed. Yet again I'm left wishing that the series was longer. Six hour long episodes would be so much better than six of thirty minutes.
Everything screams sequel at this point. The Angel shouts that Door's sister is still alive, as he gets sucked off into nothingness. Croup and Vandemar will clearly be back, because they're Croup and Vandemar. Richard leaves London Below to go home, after first being dubbed Sir Richard Of Maybury, Warrior of London Below, by the Earl of Earl's Court; only to decide that what he really wants is a life underground being weird. And who wouldn't decide that, frankly. Up pops the Marquis to take him back down, and off we go into Neverwhere II. Except that we don't, because they never made it. And Neil Gaiman, after twelve odd years of hinting, still hasn't written it.
Git.
One dead Marquis, and...
... one not-quite-so-dead Marquis. Hurrah!
Richard meets a vampire in the queue for a take-out curry. As you do.
Vampired, London Below style.
Croup and Vandemar steal away with Door.
The Mystical Highland Cow Of London Below.
Just the Marquis being cool, really.
The Marquis confronts the Angel.
An oddly pleasing sentence, and a very pleasing scene.
Not a nice and fluffy angel.
Goodbye Islington.
Oddly, Richard's old life can't compare to the new one...
... so he summons the De Carabas Taxi Cab Service, and heads off back into London Below.
In wait of a sequel.
Hint hint.
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