Today looked like film again - and Amazon Prime kindly sent me an advertising email yesterday. Some highly rated stuff - so I said I'd give it a shot! Highest among them - that I'd be interested in - is Good Omens, a sci-fi comedy about the end of the world. Somebody has triggered Armageddon, it seems, and it's up to an angel (Michael Sheen) and a demon (David Tennant) to stop it. Frances McDormand is God, who narrates, Miranda Richardson plays the hapless medium who represents the first recorded case of angelic possession. Based on a book co-written by Terry Pratchett, it looked quite clever - and I do love that the Antichrist is a small boy. Seems so appropriate. Anyway, I love that kind of stuff - and end-of-the-world stories seem so appropriate, these days!
Plenty of free time this afternoon to watch a couple of episodes. And yay, it is clever! One of those where you can coast along, or you can really pay attention, to catch all the references. They borrow heavily from The Omen, where the Antichrist is swapped, as a baby, with the son of an American diplomat, thus placing him in a position of potential power and influence. And when he's a bit older, he gets a hellhound as a companion and protector. Watch how they play with these ideas, though! David Tennant gets reptilian eyes - when you can see them, as he usually wears sunglasses. And there are fantastic subplots regarding a family of fortune-telling witches, the descendant of a witchfinder, and the, em, four horsemen of the Apocalypse. We've only met War so far, mind - strutting her stuff in the Middle East, naturally. Mind you, they've dropped Conquest and Plague (outdated, I guess) in favour of the more familiar Death - and the on-trend Pollution. I'm gonna enjoy meeting them..
Excellent series - good fun, but also with enough historical and mythological detail, and knowing references, to keep us nerds happy. Terrific CGI, as you'd expect. It's a real shame there is only one series - I hope they make more, when possible. I see there was a massive swell of protest against this, saying they were making light of Satanism - funny how you never hear of people protesting about books, like the one this is based on. Well, except for the Muslims. I suppose the others don't read so much..?
Will be delighted to keep watching this..
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