Cleverness, he thinks, will get you nowhere

Continuing my trip down The Guardian's Top 50 TV Shows of 2021.  

#48 : The North Water

Now that his days as a heart-throb leading man are over, Colin Farrell can concentrate on what he does best: intriguing character work. The North Water saw him bulk up and head out to the Arctic, where he could terrify the crew of a whaling ship to impossible ends. His best performance in years.

I know this got good write-ups but never got anywhere close to watching it - it didn't feel like "my sort of thing".  Let's see if it isn't, shall we?

Throughout the series, we follow Patrick Sumner (played by Jack O'Connell) who takes up a place as a doctor on an Arctic whaling ship captained by Captain Brownlee (Stephen Graham) and featuring various ne'er-do-wells including Drax (Colin Farrell) and Cavendish (Sam Spruell).  This is obviously the sort of thing that no-one in the right mind would decide was a good idea, unless they were unable to get anything else.  And, funnily enough, as the journey progresses, the reasons he's had to take the position becomes clear.  And other stuff happens.  Bad stuff.  That's all you really need to know at this point really.  

A ship is always a good location for this sort of thing (see also - Vigil) and the whaling ship is even better since everyone has secrets - it really doesn't look like anyone would volunteer to do this without good reason because it's hard work.  And messy - this series features waaaay more intestines than I was expecting!  The weather's not particularly pleasant either - it feels like they all would have died several times over in the conditions they experienced, but that might not have made for such an interesting series (don't worry though, plenty of deaths still occur).

I'm intrigued how much was filmed in inhospitable conditions - the scenery is absolutely fantastic but I've no idea how much of it is real (this is quite an interesting read which answers that question).  The retro features are also well done, although some of the effects do feel a little cheap at times (I'm guessing either there was only so much money to go round or Health * Safety decided that killing the actors wasn't a great idea).  The sound is impressive though - the inclement weather was well represented over my surround sound speakers.

It's all well acted - Drax is a fascinating character and very well played by Colin Farrell and he's certainly bulked up for the part.  Jack O'Connell has a more straightforward part as the best of a bad lot, but he still manages to have more twists and turns that you might expect.  Stephen Graham is as reliably excellent as ever - this is his third appearance on this list and he got a spot on the best films of 2021 list as well, so it's been a good year for the lad.

It's also well written which you'd expect of an adaptation of a highly regarded book - it is all somewhat ridiculous Boys Own adventure stuff, but enjoyably so and it has a much more morally ambiguous ending than I was expecting.  It is a bit slow in places - it feels like it could quite easily have been four episodes (five episodes seems like an odd number).  But I'd also say it winds the tension up nicely and you're never entirely sure what's going to happen next.

So - is it "my sort of thing"?  Well, no, not really - but that didn't mean I didn't enjoy it.  I doubt anyone who watched it thought it was GREAT but I also imagine it didn't lose too many viewers across the season either.  I'd recommend it if you like "boys doing some acting at being boys" - I've no idea who this might refer to though!

At time of writing, it's available to watch on iPlayer - I expect it'll be there for a bit yet if you're tempted to check it out.

#47 - An odd entry in the list
#49 - Horrifyingly fascinating