Even in Paradise, keep your friends close, but your enemies closer
TV COMMENT
A FAMILY holiday to Malta alongside three of your oldest university friends and their spouses and offspring, what could possibly go wrong?
Quite a lot, as it so happens, with ancient secrets coming to light amidst current dodgy text messages on supposedly devoted husband’s phone.
Jill Halfpenny’s Kate is excited to join old pals Jenny and Rowan at the enormous luxury villa Rowan has organised for them all to stay in to soak up the Maltese sun and reconnect.
Kate’s teen daughter Lucy is the same age as Jenny’s slightly menacing son Jake, and Kate’s younger son and Rowan’s daughter are close enough in age to keep each other company.
The vivacious woman who makes up the all-important foursome is Izzy, who came into their lives through Kate’s Irish husband Sean, and along with Alistair (Jenny’s husband), and Russ (Rowan’s) the gang is complete. Keeping up? I’ll be testing you later.
The good news is that the gang at the villa make up the entirety of the cast, so figuring out who belongs to whom, and who may be the instigator of the inevitable tragedy doesn’t take long.
The Holiday began on Virgin Media One last Thursday and consists of a very palatable four episodes, all of which are on the Virgin Media Player, or if you prefer your television taken by appointment, continues with the penultimate episode on St. Patrick’s Day.
Based on a novel by TM Logan, The Holiday has the beautiful Mediterranean setting going for it, with the women swanning around in flowing kaftans and short-shorts, and the men battling it out over the barbecue. On the surface everything is just tickity-boo, but cracks soon begin to show.
It’s revealed over a dinner punctuated repeatedly by barely concealed snipes and barbs directed towards most every adult member of the party that Kate, a detective back in England, all but destroyed Rowan’s first marriage when she accused him of cheating on her friend.
Later on, Jenny confesses to Kate that she slept with her husband back in their uni days; Jake is corrupting Lucy with weed and vodka; and then there are those illicit texts to worry about.
Kate finds herself increasingly under pressure to put on a cheerful front while getting to the bottom of her husband’s supposed infidelity. There is plenty going on while the fire we see the crew escape from in prologues and epilogues in each episode should make for an intriguing series.
But the languid setting, gorgeous as it is, slows the pace down, with the heaviness of the heat palpable. All the alcohol consumption and depictions of inebriation does the same, by blanketing proceedings with a fuggy mist that gets in the way of problem-solving clarity.
The performances are all fine – interestingly the majority of the cast is Irish, but with only Owen McDonnell as Sean using his native accent.
The four-part structure is the biggest plus, as even though my interest has waned over what the mystery is going to turn out to be (who’s having the affair, is the fire set deliberately, is that a body at the bottom of a cliff?), I’ll more than likely give two more precious hours away to finding out what happens next.
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At least a disastrous holiday with former friends can be escaped from eventually, but one place you have to be very careful about who you bring with you is the afterlife.
Quirky comedy Upload has returned to Amazon Prime for its second series, following Nathan Brown as he navigates life after death in a computer simulation.
Set in the near future, technology has advanced to the point that those willing to can upload their consciousness into a programme just at the point of dying, in order to live on in a paradise of their choosing.
The quality of your afterlife unfortunately depends on what you can afford, so some will find themselves in luxurious surroundings while the others in what can only be construed as a grotty student hostel.
At the end of season 1, Robbie has found himself falling in love with his (still alive) handler Nora, but the arrival of girlfriend Ingrid, whose family is funding Robbie’s afterlife, is about to throw a spanner in the works.
It’s very much a comedy, but there are moments of poignancy and heart that prevent Upload from veering into total silliness. Reminiscent of The Good Place, this funny little curiosity will make you think how much an individual life is really worth.