Mammals

Well I was decently gripped from start to end and I wanted to finish the whole series in one session. Nice and short at just 30 mins a piece so not a hard task. The acting was slightly over the top by Cordon but Hawkins was standout and the fantastical side plot drew me in.

The locations and cinematography were great, it shot the beautiful aspect of cities and countryside.

There seems to be a lot of negative reviews and I was almost put off watching this pretty decent series based on these however I am glad I flicked it on the box last night. Definitely worth a watch, even for a non James Cordon fan.

...from a totally illogical dislike of James Corden. I have no idea why. And it's been going on a long time. Long before he sort of proved me right becoming all ffar too americanny and then with the omelette incident. I've never seen Gavin and Stacey so I have no idea what he was like in that. I just saw clips of car pool karaoke and things like that which made me want to kick my TV screen in. However, he is excellent in this, as is everyone. Melia Kreiling was wonderful in Tyrant and she is equally good in this and sorry, but i have to say, she is truly beautiful to the point of taking ones breath away. I love the storyline, the Coco Chanel thread which is bonkers but works and whoever chose the music throughout has to be greatly commended. This show is really DIFFERENT and it works. I get the feeling it is what Gervais was aiming for with afterlife - the feeling, not the story - and this shows how badly he missed after series one. I put off watching this due to my Cordenophobia - I heartily reccomend you do not do the same as you will be missing a treat.

I echo the surprise at the poor reviews. I'm guessing they're driven by Mr Cordon's media personality? But! If you dislike someone don't watch their work.

Mr Cordon, I'm sure, at times, can be disagreeable; as can we all. I'm not American, therefore don't watch his chat show, so, I've come to this untainted and think the show is okay. It's decent.

Cordon does a good job in this retelling of a story old as time. The show has that English sense of mirth in misery; which gives it a realistic touch. No insincere Hollywood dramatisation here.

It's not a jolly old comedy romp and it's not supposed to be. In my opinion, it's a dark comedy that will make you feel uneasy and occasional smile.

James Corden will always be Smithy from Gavin and Stacey to me and I did like him in that role. Then he moved to the USA, got his own show and went all "Hollywood". When I saw that he was starring in this new series on Prime I was going to give it a miss until I saw Colin Morgan's name. I held my nose and pressed play so I could at least watch Colin. I have to say it was far better than I expected. JC was ok (a more serious Smithy) and Colin didn't disappoint (a very different and cute role for him). The first episode hooked me straight away due to the small twist at the end. The scenery, countryside and homes were beautiful. The Tom Jones cameo topped it off.

Until I watched Mammals and read the references to James Corden, I'd never heard of him. I still don't know much so this review is based only on the show, nothing else.

The story is nothing special, boy-meets-girl, fall in love and then out of love (will they get back together?), but the low-key presentation and somewhat laconic humour make it mildly amusing. Corden's strength in Mammals is not humour though, but a searing, almost child-like, emotional honesty. This is more interesting than the somewhat 'modern' reliance on bathos (think The Office, or Fleabag). A lot of what passes for humour here is bathetic, but if comedy is the art of saying something serious in an amusing way, then there is enough here to entertain.

Where it falls down, and quite hard, is the meandering fantasy of one of the characters that doesn't seem to serve any purpose in the story arc.

No one comes out of this particularly well, and I was left a bit deflated and wondering why Mammals had been presented this way (the advertising photo is utterly meaningless). It's okay, but there is much better out there.