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As a child or even a teenager, I wasn't much of a reader. Despite having lots of books in the house, I paid very little attention to them because the authors had similar, local-sounding names, and the stories in their books were about the same people I knew in real life. And the greyness and boringness of life were enough for me to experience in reality, so I rarely looked at our bookshelves' contents. Little did I know that at some point later in my childhood, I would discover the great genre of an “adventure” novel, and so much did I love it, that my lovely mother subscribed to an entire adventure classics collection.

I ended up reading stories imagining what it would be like to seek treasure as a pirate roaming the oceans, about the Aztecs and their tribes, about life in Africa or Australia – countries that seemed so far away that I imagined it would take a lifetime to get there on my own. I read about the Amazons and Robinson Crusoe, and Sherlock Holmes, and Jules Verne’s stories were, of course, out of this world for me, sending my imagination out into the galaxy and beyond. I read Maurice Leblanc’s “The Secret Tomb” and wanted to be Dorothy and H. Rider Haggard’s “King Solomon's Mines”, and it seemed like the world was, after all, an interesting place to live in, as long as you find the right story to dwell into. But before I discovered all of that, I found “The Count of Monte Cristo”.

Alexandre Dumas’s story of loss, revenge, and forgiveness has entrapped my imagination and swallowed me whole; it became my bedtime book, and sometimes I refused to go to school without it – I simply worried that something would happen with it while I was gone. A year or two later, I would get my first computer and have my first “accounts” that, of course, required me to come up with a username. Let’s just say, it took some time for my sister to dissuade me from choosing Mercedes as my alias, because according to her, everyone would assume I meant the car, and not the book character. She was, of course, right, but my obsession knew no boundaries.

Because this book is the first I enjoyed reading and finishing to the end, it remains extremely important for me. It’s not just a fun adventure story but something that changed my life entirely and sent me on the course of finding some adventure myself. And of course, with equal importance, I treat new interpretations of this wonderful tale, among which is the 2025 TV series titled “The Count of Monte Cristo”.

Let me assure you from the beginning: I loved, loved, loved this rendition of the story. The acting, setting, music – everything worked very well for my taste, nothing was over the top, and nothing was missing. Despite the 200 years that had passed since Dumas had written this novel, it couldn’t be more modern. Not only are its political elements never out of style, with Edmund being imprisoned for a crime he did not commit, or Abbé suffering from his wisdom and outspokenness, or Villefort protecting his own career by condemning an honest man to eternal suffering. Love is big here, too, with Edmund and Mercedes being so cruelly and unjustly separated in their youthful, pure love, Fernand blind with his obsession with custom and want of Mercedes, the clearly queer-coded relationship between Eugénie and Louise – not too shabby for a 200-year-old novel.

Edmund’s impossible quest to hold faith and not lose hope is so well transferred to the screen, and Sam Claflin is just so damn good at it that it never stops being entertaining. He also gets to have his Gary Oldman/Sirius Black’s “I did my waiting” moment that he performs with the same intensity and skill as the other genius actor. Speaking of geniuses: Jeremy Irons is in this show, too, and is brilliant and lovely in the role of the abbot. 

Edmund swears vengeance on his enemies and goes on a long path of playing God, giving mercy to no one, only to drop the play and realize what life is really for: attendre et espérer! 

It was lovely, 10 out of 10.

Total Line Count Of Main Characters in The Office