TV REVIEW: In The Flesh - Episode Three

After Kieren (Luke Newberry) defied the town and convinced Rick (David Walmsley) to not shoot the two zombies they had found in the woods, both are faced with having to deal with the consequences of their actions. For Kieren, his flashbacks mean he thinks he can finally give some peace to Lisa's family, the girl he killed in the supermarket. It also leads to some quality reconciliation with his sister Jem (Harriet Cains) who spared his life on that fateful day between the aisles and some home truths with his parents (Marie Critchley and Steve Cooper). Elsewhere, Bill (Steve Evets) is still reeling from Rick's decision and decides that his son needs reminding of his duty to the village of Roarton. Employing Vicar Oddie (Kenneth Cranham) to give a sermon about rising to a challenge, Bill convinces Rick that the only thing to be done is to kill Kieren.

Highly emotional from start to finish, the third episode tied up a few of the loose threads of the series. In The Flesh has grown in strength each episode and the third brings about a resolution that is tragic, emotional and heartbreaking. As always, there were many issues and themes dealt with in this episode, from suicide, familial relationships and their breakdown to second chances and a need for redemption. Once again, Dominic Mitchell delicately balanced all of this into a satisfying conclusion to In The Flesh. There were many strong scenes in this episode, Keiren and his mother in the den, Amy's departure and the reconciliation with Jem, and each provided a small sense of closure to their respective storylines, yet still leaving enough should the opportunity to continue arise.

The strong material gave the cast plenty to work with and the performances throughout the series have been of the highest calibre with this episode no different, but it is to the fathers and sons to whom we must turn. In an instalment full of emotional moments, the most heartbreaking had to be the overdue confrontation between Keiren and his father, Steve. Kieren's parents were ever-present but had taken something of backseat in the proceedings, spouting ill-advised comments whilst trying to cope with the return of their son. Steve especially had just been placating rather than actively attempting to re-connect with him. In this episode, we finally heard why. Cooper's monologue about discovering Kieren's body was well-pitched, tear-jerking without descending into histrionics. Like many of the scenes in In The Flesh, its strength lay in the grounded nature of the drama. This was a man who had lost his son and couldn't understand why.

The parallels to Bill Macy and his struggle with his own son Rick were clear. Evets has been one of the show's strongest assets, displaying a man so rigid and fixed in his attitudes that he simply cannot accept his own son, constructing fantasy after fantasy to excuse his behaviour. Combining a fierce brutality and a tragic vulnerability, Bill Macy was a fascinating and powerful character whose strength lay in feeling so terrifyingly real. Walmsley also deserves a mention as the deeply conflicted Rick, torn between his love for Kieren and his sense of duty to his father. Offered a triumphant scene in which he stands up to Bill, 'au naturale' as Amy would put it, Rick gets his chance to finally be himself before he is tragically killed once again.

Newberry has been a relatively calm central figure as Kieren, the seemingly lone sensitive character in a town full of bullish locals, his outcast nature exacerbated by his PDS. Last episode, we got to see both Kieren's more humourous side with Amy, as well as his more tragic, when he confessed to her that he had killed himself. The third, however, requires him to run the whole range of emotions, from grief to happiness, to pure, unadulterated rage. 

Unfortunately, I don't feel that Kieren was given entirely the resolution that the character deserved. Yes, he got given the second chance to reconnect with his family and live again rather than end his life as before, but his relationship with Rick felt unresolved. Although Rick's death was necessary for Kieren's redemption, with all of the build-up and conflict in their relationship, it did not feel as if their relationship had reached any point of resolution; they still remained apart, neither able to speak their feelings to the other. But then again, maybe that was the point. After all, In The Flesh has been so grounded in reality and it does not always end with a happy ending. Nevertheless, the "Ren and Rick 4ever" aspect of the narrative felt a little unfinished.

Whilst the three episodes of In The Flesh work well as self-contained story, there feels like there is so much left to explore in the world that Dominic Mitchell has so brilliantly realised. The series' allegorical nature meant many themes abounded during its run-time and supporting characters acted as signifiers rather than functioning in their own right. If it was to get a second series, it would offer Mitchell a chance to explore these themes and characters more. Personally, I want to see more of Kenneth Cranham and the show's religious allusions or find out what happens to Amy and the undead revolutionary types. 

The show has great potential and there a wealth of directions that it can go in, whether that be focusing on Kieren and his family to exploring the wider post-Rising world, I only hope that BBC Three are willing to support it in the future.

- Becky

You can read Becky's previous reviews of In The Flesh here.

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TV REVIEW: In The Flesh - Episode Two

The second episode of BBC Three's excellent zombie drama continues with Rick returning to Roarton and Kieran continuing to deal with his troubled homecoming as best he can.

Denial and the subsequent hypocrisy are very much the key themes of this episode with Bill Macy (Steve Evets) having to deal with his PDS sufferer son Rick (David Walmsley) returning from Afghanistan and the fallout of his return for the Human Volunteer Force. Keiran (Luke Newberry) continues to struggle at home as he is forced to hide from the town whilst his parents try to keep the news of Rick's return from him. Fortunately, his existence is interrupted by the arrival of Amy (Emily Bevan), a loud and proud PDS sufferer who helps Luke out of his shell. Once Rick and Keiran are reunited, even more tension comes to the fore in the small town of Roarton as none of the residents are quite sure how to deal with having PDS sufferers in their midst.

The beauty of this episode is that if you took away the supernatural elements, there is still a touching and affecting story about a troubled relationship at its heart. The build-up to the meeting between Rick and Kieran was deftly handled, drip-feeding information about their relationship rather than stating anything explicitly; Rick's emotional reaction to hearing of Kieran's death was a small but significant moment and Kieran's constant glances towards portraits of Rick said far more than any few lines stating they were in a relationship could have done. Whilst it is again yet to be stated outright, the two are, or were, in love with each other and having to deal with the consequences of this in their small-town nightmare would have made for an intriguing drama in itself. The fact that they are both undead goes even further to making the waters that little bit more muddied.

Rick and Kieran's relationship may be transferring some of the show's themes from the more metaphorical to the more literal, but there is still plenty to be mined from the way in which In The Flesh is using the zombie aspect to elaborate and explore different themes of prejudice. The Partially Deceased Syndrome and its sufferers have become a well-handled symbol of any societal outcast and this week, various were explored. The obvious was the relationship between Rick and his father Bill, a man who clearly has a difficult time accepting his son for who he is. We get lines loaded with meaning about Rick's handling of guns, his treatment of women and his drinking habits and for Bill, this is all about creating his son into the ultimate masculine symbol. I suspect that, with his animosity towards Kieran, Bill deep down knows that Rick is gay, but refuses to acknowledge this fact, just as he knows his son is a PDS sufferer, but will not treat him as such, nor will he allow anyone else to. 

Elswhere in the episode, the performances continue to be excellent and Bevan's Amy is breath of fresh undead air in the town of Roarton, challenging prejudices and provoking all of the characters into thinking about their situations just that little bit more. I'd like to see more of Kenneth Cranham's hate-spouting vicar, but he forms an intriguing background figure though given little more development than as a physical manifestation of the town's prejudice. Evets also continues to portray the conflicted father well, able to register his internal struggle with his son with little more than a frown. However, it is to the two leads who I reserve the most praise; Walmsley and Newberry have managed to make an undisclosed relationship very affecting in just a few short scenes and the exchange between the two of them in the Jeep was a fantastic piece of drama.

With only one more episode remaining in this current run, there are a lot of loose ends to be tied up for the characters in In The Flesh, but with a series that has stated its intent and carried out its purpose with such confidence, I have every faith that we will be provided with a satisfying conclusion. Now all we need is for BBC Three to commission another series. 

- Becky

You can read Becky's review of Episode One here.

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TV REVIEW: In The Flesh - Episode One

A concept so original, it's actually quite startling that no one had thought of it before, In The Flesh is set in the aftermath of a zombie uprising, a world in which the undead have been rehabilitated and medicated to become Partially Deceased Syndrome (PDS) sufferers. Focusing in on one PDS sufferer in particular, we follow Keiran (Luke Newberry) back to his parents' home as he deals with his new affliction and the consequences of both that and his death back in 2009. Meanwhile, a group known as the Human Volunteer Force (HVF), who really really don't like anyone with PDS and will take quite violent steps to stop them coming back into the community, remain on their guard in Keiran's home town.

Good horror or science fiction is always at its best when acting as a mirror to our own society, rather than just offering up victims to be sliced or diced by the mad scientist. In The Flesh does this brilliantly, packing in more metaphors, analogies and themes than you can shake a zombie-killing cricket bat at. The most obvious is the theme of prejudice and the notion of PDS can be applied to just about any form you can think of. With its reality of living with a disease and relying upon daily medication, my first thought was of PDS as a metaphor for HIV and In The Flesh would not look out of place as a reaction to the public stigmatisation of that particular condition. 

The village of Roarton, a microcosm for wider society, brings a whole new meaning to the phrase 'grim up North' and it is this particularly that highlights the satirical side of this horror narrative. The emphasis on people who are seen as 'not quite human' could be a cypher for homophobia or racism, invading the community of 'normal' people and supposedly destroying them from within. The role of the church is also thrown in there with Kenneth Cranham's fire-and-brimstone vicar extolling all sorts of Biblical justification for the alienation of the PDS victims. 

Then there's also the Biblical references in the zombie gathering taking place online and gearing up for the revolution, building in another potential theme of religious fanaticism. It's not all big soaring institutional metaphors though, there are also smaller themes like the breakdown of a family, the loss of a child and sibling relationships. Like I said, it's jam-packed, but the satire of In The Flesh is finely tuned and extremely cutting, whilst the quieter drama also packs a punch.

For a first time television writer, Dominic Mitchell's script is assured and confident, weaving in all of these themes without it seeming too shoe-horned in. It is also to its benefit that it chooses to go at a slower pace rather than trying to draw in viewers by packing the episode full of action it doesn't need. Kieran's flashbacks to his zombie days are more than enough to give you an idea of what the zombie uprising was like and fills enough of the gore quota to keep horror fans happy. The pace allows for the more philosophical aspects of the narrative to develop and I'm particularly interested to see where the plotline of the fanatical Bill Macy (Steve Evets) and his PDS son goes. 

The pace also allows the action-orientated sequences to shine with the climactic confrontation between the HVF and Ricky Tomlinson's character, Ken. Ramping up the tension, with the Walker family believing the HVF are on the way, we get a big showdown in the street as poor Ken's PDS wife is dragged into the street. As set pieces go, it was both suspenseful and heart-breaking as we see just how far Bill Macy is willing to commit to his cause. I'm hoping that it is this scene that sets the tone for the rest of the series; a strong, social commentary drama with a dash of action thrown in.

An already intriguing concept to begin with, In The Flesh is off to a cracking start and if this is the standard of the rest of the series, we're going to be in for a treat. Zombies may be the go-to supernatural creature at the moment, but this is a different take on a genre close to saturation; let's just hope it remains as original and as sharp as its first episode.

- Becky

You can follow Becky on Twitter @beckygracelea or on her blog beckygracelea.wordpress.com

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