#which doesn't help

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"Do you remember when four-eyes met like 3 different neighbors and learned about a whole new culture that even chibi didn't know about because they're an errant nation?"

Hi Sophie, I finally got to finish the show. I love everything Emma does, so of course I had to give it a chance, although I am pretty biased against Teresa Palmer... It's not necessarily her acting (though she ruined The Discovery of Witches for me), but her other content. I consumed too much of it and at one point the mummy thing just started to creep me out.

But I really tried to stay open watching the new show. I think Emma did not disappoint, only the pacing of the last episode was a bit off. I absolute loved the cinematography. Most of the cast (including Teresa) really delivered. People seemed to be pretty impressed by Philippa. I think she was good (better than in the Newsreader and in Territory) but not better than Bella Heathcote or Ming-Zhu Hii. And in my opinion Catherine McClements took the cake. All in all, I was entertained, but it's not the kind of show that makes my mind wonder back to for a longer period of time like The Newsreader did. Even Secret City left a stronger impression on me.

Would love to hear your thoughts once you get to watch the show. Perhaps it can distract you a bit from your many real life demands a bit. 😉

Hi! And ah! Your timing is wild, because I actually just binged the first three eps tonight.

I hear you about Teresa, she's - - mmm. Look, I haven't seen Discovery of Witches, so can't speak to that, but I do think she's a very talented actress (2:37! Warm Bodies! Ride Like a Girl! And while I loathe both, she really is very good in Berlin Syndrome and The Clearing), and that combined with her pretty traumatising upbringing and the fact that I know quite a lot of people who've worked with her and say she's extremely lovely and professional always means I give her a bit of grace. She's definitely deep in the Byron culture though, which 😬, and the fact that she's pregnant right now with baby number 6 (six!) is just - - yes. I hear you, haha.

I've only watched the three eps so far, and Emma is, as always, a good director and genuinely exquisite with directing scenes of intimacy in particular - the scene between Philippa and Tane Williams-Accra's characters having sex for the first time since having a baby I thought was genuinely really, really beautiful, and the way that played into her mother playing music and dancing was just the right amount of enmeshed and tragic, y'know?

I do think all of the cast has been solid though. Bella's been good, but I've been particularly enjoying Ming-Zhu Hii, like you, and I'm glad Philippa's been getting so much acknowledgement, because she's had moments already where I've felt she's been pretty great (although I will say just in what I've seen so far that I feel Teresa noticably outacts her in some of their moments together, but then, Teresa is a much more experienced actress). I know Catherine has some big stuff coming up though, which I'm extremely excited for, because I adore her!

But - - yes.

The show generally from what I've watched so far is messy though. I thought the first episode script was honestly just pretty awful - heavily heavily expostitional, and I think it failed to ground us in both the stakes and the storyworld, and I was a bit relieved that the writing was a lot better for eps 2 and 3. It's still got huge issues with pacing, exposition and narrative reveals though, and I genuinely can't believe they revealed Isabelle's job and why she's there as randomly as they did in ep 2.

Also I'm not sure if it's because it's a Canadian co-production, but that heavily orange-saturated colour grade for the Australian coastline is borderline Hollywood-colour-grading-Mexico and I am BAFFLED by it. Like, as someone who's driven the Great Ocean Road multiple times in her life - and has family who still lives along it - I am genuinely shocked at the choice to colour this:

Like this:

Just - - it really is kind of shocking to me?

BUT I can't find evidence anywhere of this happening!! I know I took a screen shot of it, and I know I re-posted the screenshot somewhere... But it's just GONE from the internet!!! And from my computer!!

So I think I'm gonna have to remove that part from my project and it kills me :(