Sunshine

One of the great benefits of streaming, is that at any moment you can stumble on hidden gems that you've never heard of from other parts of the world. All the more surprising in this case, because two of the leads, Anthony LaPaglia and Melanie Lynskey are accomplished well-known actors in America. Still, I had never heard boo about a series called Sunshine Kings before I stumbled on it on the Acorn network.

The plot is a familiar one: A ragtag, underdog, down on their luck group of athletes finds a coach who himself has seen better days, and together they strive for glory. Yes it's been done before. But in this case the setting is Australia and the athletes are largely South Sudanese immigrants and refugees. Their struggle, both personal and athletic, and their relationship with the surrounding community makes this a heartwarming, compelling drama. The series has a lot of heart, and in four episodes it told a somewhat complex and interesting story. I give it a big thumbs up.

Sunshine is the kind of TV that rarely comes along in Australia. It takes a very common goal among the South-Sudanese-Australian community in Melbourne in making it big in basketball and turns it into a very effective, engaging, and emotional story, one that includes and humanises just about everyone, whether black, white, immigrant, Australian-born, etc. It will have you feeling sorry for both criminals and racists, and I'm not saying that negatively. It embraces and showcases both the good and bad things about all of its characters, all of which are grounded heavily in reality.

The absolute best performance you will ever see from Anthony LaPaglia and decent performances from the new South-Sudanese actors. The only glaring problem is that some of the auxiliary South- Sudanese characters are very clearly just random people from the community, and their acting shows it.

That said, all of the acting is good enough that it doesn't take away from the overall strength of the production. The lead actor, Wally Elnour, is not the best of the three Sudanese leads (I'd say Deng was the best), but his work is adequate and I hope to see him develop more in the future.

Highly recommend this series and I hope to see more like this from SBS in the future; every suburb has its own tale to tell.

Additionally, I especially recommend this series to foreigners who would like a realistic depiction of what Australian urban life can be like.

Kept me interested throughout. Very real for anyone who has spent time in Western Melbourne and/or with the Sudanese community. High quality production, fantastic acting from Anthony LaPaglia. Definitely worth taking the time to watch this one.