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| Taken from Google Images |
Title- The Great
Creators- Tony McNamara
Cast- Elle Fanning, Nicholas Hoult and Phoebe Fox with ensemble cast.
Genre- Comedy Drama, Historical, Satirical
Length- 10 episodes
Platform- All4 (UK)
Rating- 3/5 stars
Plot
The Great is a satirical, comedic drama about the rise of Catherine the Great from outsider to the longest-reigning female ruler in Russia's history. The series is fictionalised and portrays Catherine in her youth and marriage with Emperor Peter III (amalgamated with Peter II) focusing on the plot to kill her depraved and dangerous husband.
Taken from Wikipedia.
Opinions
My family and I had seen this floating around for a while, which made us want to watch it. We knew it had some connection to the creative team behind The Favourite, which we had enjoyed. I'll admit that while I vaguely knew who Catherine the Great is, I didn't know much about her. The poster, the creative team and the premise had peaked my interest so we decided to watch it.
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| Taken from Google Images |
One of the shows strong points was that it had a very good cast. I'd almost say that a cast this good was wasted on this show, which I'll get into later. I haven't seen much of Elle Fanning's performances before, but I really thought she shone in this role and held the show together. Nicholas Hoult is such a good actor and this role was quite narrow, so he didn't get a chance to flourish in it. The supporting cast of Phoebe Fox, Sacha Dhawan and Adam Godley were all excellent. The cast and their performances are a reason to watch this show.
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| Taken from Google Images |
Let's get into the things that didn't work for me. It took me quite a few episodes to get into it and actually start enjoying it. The middle few episodes were the ones I enjoyed the most, with the ending feeling rushed. A lot of my problems with the show came from the overuse of swearing, sex and violence. Sometimes, these can be used to a good effect, however this show used them so many times that they lost their impact. In the first episode, Peter shoots the bear he gave to Catherine. I don't know if this really happened, but it was the first of many, unnecessary moments of gratuitous violence. There was a whole episode around Peter torturing the court. It made for unpleasant viewing. Yes, this period in history was quite violent and if they had used it for dramatic impact, rather than in every episode, I believe they would have been able to achieve a more profound impact on what Peter was like. It also felt like every other word Peter said was a swear word. It just made his character very shallow and two dimensional.
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| Taken from Google Images |
We originally went into The Great thinking it was a mini-series. We thought it was about 7-8 episodes long and would be contained within those episodes. We were very surprised that it was a 10 episode long series, with a second series having been announced. Similar to my comments on the violence, I think that dragging out this story is going to loose its impact. There was another series about Catherine, called Catherine the Great, which I believe was a mini series and much more successful.
I had really wanted to enjoy this show, but it just ended up not being for me. I think the writing really let it down, as the performances, set/costume design and production value were really good. I don't think I'll be continuing with this, despite having a bit of an interest for where this story goes. I'm just not sure I can stomach anymore of the violence used in this show and the overuse of swear words. That is why I gave the show 3/5 stars, it had it's merits, but it also had it's downsides.
What did you think of The Great?
Carenza :) x
