Grantchester (2014) s06e07

This season of “Grantchester” has been very much about helplessness and hopelessness. It’s even worse watching it from the present, knowing the U.K. didn’t “legalize” homosexuality until 1967 for consenting adults over age twenty-one. So the central conflict of this season cannot have a cheerful ending. But after this episode, a hopeful one seems possible.

After avoiding Al Weaver’s experiences in jail, this episode’s mostly about them. Even when it’s not about them—war pal Shaun Dooley proves a continued bad influence on Robson Green, including Green lying to wife Kacey Ainsworth about hanging out with him. She disapproves of the relationship, not Dooley. The jail plotline factors in. Green and Tom Brittney are investigating a case in jail, including inmates in solitary confinement, which pushes Green further into his bad memories of a Burmese prison camp.

Green working through his PTSD, specifically how he drinks to avoid working through it, has been one of the season’s other subplots. His alcoholism has again become a problem, one he won’t let anyone help with. Even with the hopeful, less helpless ending, it’s hard to imagine how they’re going to get Green to a good place in two episodes for the season finale. But “Grantchester”’s definitely doing a fine job with the character development arcs running underneath the weekly murder mysteries.

And after the last episode setting new curate Ahmed Elhaj up to be a shitty person, this episode turns him into the straight man for the jokes. Brittney’s trying to be nicer to him even though home doesn’t feel like home without Weaver. So there are some awkward, genial scenes for them. Then there’s also Emily Patrick—Brittney’s step-sister—crashing at the vicarage and doing whatever she can to make Elhaj feel awkward.

The Patrick subplot feels entirely shoehorned in and even then truncated like they cut some material from the subplot. At one point, Brittney’s saying she can’t move in. In the next, she’s already there.

The episode mystery’s particularly effective because it involves Weaver’s fellow inmates, most of whom are apparently just gay men being persecuted by the government, then tormented by guards and prison administrators. Hence why it all feels so hopeless.

There’s some excellent character development from Weaver, who’s superb. He doesn’t actually get a lot to do—the development’s presumably setup–but what he gets, he excels with. Excellent work from Green and Ainsworth too. The season’s plot threads are working out exquisitely. Save the Patrick subplot, but that one’s at least funny now and no longer cringe-inducing.

Daisy Coulam’s script and Jermain Julien’s direction are also outstanding. It’s a very strong episode.

Grantchester (2014) s06e06

This episode toggles between being a thankless bridging episode and a reminder late fifties England wasn’t just a hotbed of homophobia–there’s also a bunch of rampant, violent misogyny. Plus, old people are bigots. Plus, religious zealots are different kinds of bigots, even if they’re Black. Religion… an intersection of garbage. Though religious nonsense does often sound pretty when spoken aloud, which is what the episode ends up leveraging in the finale. But it’s mostly just a bridging episode.

Three significant issues get development.

First, “Grantchester” manages to find Tom Brittney a sexual liaison so tawdry and ill-advised, it’d make former vicar Sidney Chambers blush even though Sidney was a man-slut. It’s actually such an obvious big swing it’s shocking Robson Green didn’t respond to Brittney’s revelation with a, “wow, not even Sidney would’ve done that.” It’s a weird personality and character development bit for Brittney (seriously, they got rid of intrepid girl reporter Lauren Carse for this romance?). Though some of the illicit behavior is well-acted. Not enough but some.

Second, guest star Shaun Dooley is back to help Green realize being a shitty old white guy isn’t cool, actually. They don’t deal with any of the overarching copper versus crooked lawyer stuff, but they do introduce Dooley to Green’s wife, Kacey Ainsworth, and their oldest daughter, Skye Lucia Degruttola. Ainsworth and Degruttola love having someone around to tell them about Green’s war days because he’s still suffering too much from his untreated because it’d be unmanly PTSD. Whereas Dooley’s a sociopath and is okay talking about it. Poetic too. It’s kind of a good arc for Green, kind of not. He and Dooley don’t have any chemistry as pals, so even though the episode rushes Brittney and Green patching things up (they’re fighting about Brittney being a spoiled rich kid again), it’s welcome. Especially since Green’s pissed Ainsworth likes Dooley and is shitty to her.

Finally, the episode introduces Ahmed Elhaj as the new curate. He’s second-generation Black British, parents from Nigeria. He’s got to suffer Brittney being rude because Brittney didn’t want to hire anyone, and Elhaj was assigned. And then there’s Tessa Peake-Jones being racist. Elhaj’s super-sympathetic until we find out he’s a shifty bigot out to correct wayward, ungodly Brittney and company. The hard cliffhanger is the reveal of his villainy.

I haven’t even talked about the mystery plot, which is basically just fifties dudes being rapey, murdery, or otherwise just shitty. It’s indistinctly unpleasant and overly busy. Green also lets a murder accomplice get away, and it doesn’t even matter in the grand scheme, not with all those little schemes going on.

It’s not a terrible episode, just an inauspicious first outing from writer Tolula Dada.

The season was on a continued upswing, but this episode loses the plot. Or maybe “Grantchester” just isn’t “Grantchester” without Al Weaver.

Grantchester (2014) s06e05

Half this episode may be setting up for a regular villain—at least semi-regular villain—arc for the rest of the season. “Grantchester” doesn’t do Moriarties. Or, if they do, I’ve forgotten all of them. But the potential return nemesis isn’t important—not even to Robson Green, who has to sort of shrug it off—because it’s Al Weaver’s trial for gross indecency. The episode, written by show creator Daisy Coulam, with Jermain Julien directing, does a lovely job. It’s absolutely devastating stuff, but it’s also lovely to see how Weaver’s gotten to fully realize this character and his growth.

Especially since there are finally scenes for Tessa Peake-Jones to have the hard conversations she’s been avoiding for seasons on end. The episode starts with Kacey Ainsworth having organized several other progressive people (all women) to support Weaver. She’s trying to get Peake-Jones to come along but doesn’t have much success. Worse, Peake-Jones is against husband Nick Brimble standing up to testify for Weaver as a character witness. Brimble doesn’t get a lot of heavy lifting to do on “Grantchester” and doesn’t here either, but he does a splendid job with what he gets, and it carries through the entire episode. There are great arcs for everyone—except Green, who’s got a weird confidence in the legal system to be empathetic to gay people.

But it’s Weaver, Peake-Jones, and Tom Brittney’s episode. They’ve got to navigate through time period constraints and overcoming personal prejudices constraints and just plain shitty realities constraints. At moments it’s nearly aspirational. Weaver has some particularly accomplished scenes, though there’s the caveat the scenes witness him experiencing trauma. It’s all either heartbreaking or rending. And it’s done superbly well.

Julien goes all out on directing the mystery plot, which has Green and Brittney trying to figure out what’s up with a hinky bank robbery. The guy—Tyger Drew-Honey—seems off, so does the guy who gets robbed (Phill Langhorne). Thrown into the mix of the day is Green’s old Army chum Shaun Dooley showing up to represent someone at the station. Then shitbag copper Bradley Hall toggling from being gleeful at the idea of Weaver’s trial and desperately flirting with actual cool lady Melissa Johns. It’s not even a question of her doing better; it’s a question of her not dating pond scum. Fingers crossed it’s not a future subplot.

The mystery’s fine, but it’s busy work to distract—literally since Green has to do copper stuff and not go sit in support of Weaver—and then it’s all a setup for, presumably, a returning villain. At least it looks great, and Green’s arc is good. Brittney’s just along for the ride, though he does have the “eureka” moment to solve it all. Albeit thanks to Weaver.

It’s a great episode. Weaver’s season arc is anguishing stuff, and they handle it just right.

Grantchester (2014) s06e04

Despite having a frustratingly bland main plot, this episode of “Grantchester” also has some of the best material I can remember ever being on the show.

The episode picks up an indeterminate period from the previous; Al Weaver is awaiting his trial for “gross indecency” and spending his days—presumably unable to perform duties as curate—in his room getting drunk on vodka and listening to jazz. No one comments it’s like having James Norton back, but it’d have been amazing if someone did. I was actually waiting for it, but then it turns out Weaver’s a nasty drunk who’s mean to everyone, including Tessa Peake-Jones and Oliver Dimsdale. The episode will end up being about Weaver and Dimsdale and being a gay couple in fifties England, and it’s phenomenal stuff. It more than makes up for the clunky A-plot.

And while the A-plot is clunky—in the course of an investigation, Robson Green finds something out about Tom Brittney’s wealthy kid upbringing, and it seemingly breaks their friendship. The majority of the episode takes place one evening in the police station, where dipshit copper Bradley Hall hauls in some drunk U.S. airmen, and then there’s a mysterious death, and none of the airmen will give statements. Brittney’s only at the station because his step-sister, Emily Patrick, has been arrested for dine-and-dashing; they’d usually let a rich girl go, but she apparently knicked a valuable; only she won’t agree to a search, so she’s just hanging around Green’s office, verbally abusing the working class.

Including new office girl Melissa Johns, who’s been around since the second episode of the season and has been likable enough, but now she gets a bunch to do, and she’s excellent.

The rift between Brittney and Green doesn’t lead to any good acting together—it’s too sudden, too contrived, too forced into the restricted confines—but it does give Green, independently, some material. Brittney and Patrick, however, do get some good scenes together, with Patrick sort of establishing herself as a decent supporting “Grantchester” character by the end of the episode. Hopefully, she won’t be too regular. She’s rather unpleasant.

Another problem with the mystery plot, besides the sort of hackneyed story, is the acting. Ben Wiggins has a bunch to do as the American officer who bonds with fellow vet Green, only Wiggins isn’t any good. It’s vaguely rude to call him out for his Brit-playing-Yank abilities considering Corey Johnson, who is American, is also bad playing an American. But the other U.S. servicemen—particularly Victor Alli, who’s a Black man in a white man’s airforce stationed in a different white man’s country—are good. And they’re British actors. So whatever’s wrong with Wiggins, it’s not his inability to cross the pond in his performance. And with him being so milquetoast, the whole plot crumbles.

It doesn’t matter, of course, because everything at the station is just busywork between Weaver and Dimsdale scenes. The acting from Dimsdale is particularly phenomenal.

Louise Ironside’s got the script credit—British shows I think really do just credit the actual writer—and while her mystery isn’t great, her narrative construction and character drama are aces. And it’s not her fault they miscast.

The great stuff here is enough to make for a genuinely spectacular episode… even accounting for the gross missteps in casting and plotting.

Grantchester (2014) s06e03

This episode succeeds in ratcheting up Al Weaver’s arc to an almost intolerable point. The cliffhanger is less shocking than the last couple of episodes. Despite being abbreviated, it actually relieves some stress in its rush. Things go from bad to worse, as a boulder of fifties bigotry strikes almost everyone in the main cast. Including people outside the vicarage like Kacey Ainsworth, who finds herself again at an impasse with Robson Green on his apparent two-facedness with the “gross indecency” law. They’re basically couples friends with Weaver and Oliver Dimsdale now, after all. There’s some profound subtext in the dialogue about Green and Ainsworth’s marriage, mainly how he can negotiate being a police officer when he doesn’t believe in the laws. It’s a nice character development scene and informs Green’s frustration with Tom Brittney later on.

Because it’s going to be up to Brittney to either lie for Weaver or exonerate him through lying. Everyone else has been in for questioning, including Tessa Peake-Jones, who has her own arc about the investigation and comes out a lot more sympathetic than initially implied. Green’s dipshit cop sidekick, Bradley Hall, is really gung ho to prosecute Weaver—and out Dimsdale too if he can—and there’s only so much Green can do to steer the interviews out of Hall’s grasp. It’s going to be up to Brittney. The episode reminds the audience every five to ten minutes.

So then the murder plot—it feels almost strange to call it the A plot, though this one does take up more of the episode because the B plot figures into both it and the Weaver plot. The murder plot involves the local town council election; tragically widowed Rebecca Front against scheming bigot entrepreneur Will Hislop (who’s so villainous he should worry about getting typecast). Front’s husband was on the town council for years and then suddenly killed himself. Front’s trying to get his chair. Hislop and cousin Orlando Wells are out to take it back for the right kind of Briton.

There’s a bit about Front as an assertive woman in the fifties, but it ends up overshadowed thanks to her pal, Jonathan Aris. Aris is a novelist in town to help her in her mourning and maybe research a new book. His interests intersect with Brittney and Green’s, so he’s around a lot. Front’s around at the beginning of the episode, but then a lot less. There are more than a few scenes where she’s used as scenery, figuratively passed between characters to get a reaction. Richard Cookson’s got the script credit; there are some really thin stretches of the plot, particularly with the murder mystery. All of the attention goes to Weaver’s arc, which Brittney unwittingly drags into the political story.

Lots of good acting. Weaver, Peake-Jones, Brittney gets in a couple terrific scenes. Gary Beadle’s back as the bigot Archdeacon. Aris could be better. There’s just something insubstantial about his performance like he and Front don’t really click as good friends; plus, he always seems like he’s going to rip off his mustache for a Scooby-Doo reveal.

But who cares about the mystery arc when the character drama stuff is so much better. “Grantchester”’s relentless this season.

Grantchester (2014) s06e02

The “A plot” involving a seemingly mercenary adoption provider (Christina Cole) ends up being almost incidental thanks to the cliffhanger. See, “Grantchester” isn’t wasting any time with the season arc involving blackmailing camp staffer Michael Abubakar coming after Al Weaver for a pay-off, so the world doesn’t find out the local curate was wiping a man’s cheek. Possibly. Abubakar had actually walked in on Weaver and boyfriend Oliver Dimsdale—trying to walk back his attempted kiss—but Abubakar didn’t understand Weaver and Dimsdale were a couple. It doesn’t help when he does find out.

So it’s not going to be something to come back later on; it’s the season subplot. The only one so far. Unless there’s something with Tom Brittney and his new obnoxious rich girl step-sister Emily Patrick. Patrick wasn’t at the wedding of Brittney’s mom, Jemma Redgrave, and her dad, Dominic Mafham, because Patrick would’ve intentionally ruined it. So Mafham shipped her away. The step-siblings are only now meeting, and they take an instant dislike to one another, both because Brittney’s a vicar and because Patrick’s a spoiled brat.

There are some great moments in the A-plot, of course, mostly involving Robson Green and fatherhood. The case involves a poor couple, Madison Clare and Eddie-Joe Robinson, whose baby—post-adoption (she consented, he did not)—is now with rich asshole Miles Jupp and his disinterested wife, Polly Frame. Robinson’s trying to get the baby back, which leads to Green and Brittney confronting Cole; for a while, it seems like there might not even be a murder this episode, just less depressing “Call the Midwife,” with Weaver’s subplot getting the spotlight, but eventually there’s a corpse.

The episode sticks to the “Call the Midwife” approach, focusing on the people involved. Again the thread of fifties misogyny comes up, with a fair amount of classism mixed in, plus Brittney flexing the Church’s muscles against secular charities like Cole’s. That tangent goes the fastest, with one of the expecting mothers, Rebecca Stone, surprisingly telling Brittney off, and he doesn’t bring it up again. Though he’s too busy interfering with Weaver’s subplot; the scene where Brittney has to remember Abubakar confronting him about Weaver’s indiscretions to think potential blackmailers is very peculiar because the audience knows Brittney should know who’s blackmailing Weaver for being gay and the holiday camp because it was one of his plots last episode. Only Brittney plays it completely oblivious. Eventually, there’s an excellent scene where Weaver has some words with Brittney about the quality of his allyship. “Grantchester” seems to be making a big swing with this subplot.

The murder resolve isn’t particularly good. It’s logically sound, and the pieces fit, and it allows for an aspirational ending—before the brutal hard cliffhanger—but it’s kind of blah. Especially since it means a big part of the episode was intentionally undercooked.

The Green parenting talk scene—when he lectures heir-minded Jupp about children—makes it pretty much worth it, though.

Grantchester (2014) s06e01

It’s summertime in “Grantchester,” and still newish vicar Tom Brittney is fully invested in his work but worried he’s missing something. He apparently gripes about it so much, curate and friend Al Weaver suggests they go on vacation. It then turns into the entire “Grantchester” cast at a fifties holiday camp. They even bring along all of Robson Green and Kacey Ainsworth’s kids, though all but Skye Lucia Degruttola disappear after a while only to return for the leaving camp sequence. For a while, it seems like bored teen Degruttola’s going to get an arc of her own—she and Weaver bond over preferring reading to hula hoop contests (you know, for kids)—and then she mad crushes on a rock ’n roller in the camp band. But she doesn’t. Because even though there’s time for adorable stuff for all the couples, Brittney’s flying solo, and he’s ready for a murder to solve.

Luckily, someone drops dead on their first night, and pretty soon, Brittney’s convinced Green they need to look into it. Mostly because local cop Sam Phillips’s a lightweight and because Green’s run out of camp things he enjoys the first night. Like drinking beer. Ainsworth occasionally shows up to get Green for date nights and the matinees, so it’s good the investigation doesn’t require the boys’ full attention. Especially since everyone in camp is trying to set Brittney up with camp staffer Jordan Alexandra. Including initially friendly staffer Michael Abubakar and camp co-owner (well, her husband owns it, but it was her father’s, but women can’t own stuff, you know) Annette McLaughlin. Not to mention all of Brittney’s friends.

He’s reluctant, however. And possibly for good reason, because once Green and Brittney start digging into the death, they discover everyone at the camp—staff and even guests—have some big secrets. Some people know some of the secrets, while others know all of the secrets, and it’s right up until the last minute before they figure out how the overlap works. It’s during a very welcome sequence for Alexandra, who has an unexpected dream entertainment career. It figures in beautifully to the not subtle, “wow, the fifties were a shit time to be a woman” commentary. Everyone gets a little bit of it—though maybe not Ainsworth, other than Degruttola’s mortified embarrassment–including Tessa Peake-Jones, McLaughlin, and principal fellow guest guest star Rachael Stirling. Stirling and McLaughlin both have bores and boars for husbands, while Peake-Jones deals with shitty Southerners.

Even with the spotlight on misogyny, the first half of the episode’s pretty fun. It’s a vacation, after all. Peake-Jones and husband Nick Brimble aren’t just adorable; she’s also not bigot-y towards Weaver and Oliver Dimsdale, so they get to nearly be a couple in public for once. Amongst good friends.

The second half gets a lot less fun, with Weaver unintentionally getting into an awkward situation followed by a perilous one. It’s a particularly affecting arc, thanks to Weaver’s performance as he’s further and further boxed in.

The mystery solution’s not a big surprise, but it’s got a bunch of good acting around it, and the episode manages to find a mostly happy balance for the close. Right up until the hard cliffhanger for what seems to be the season arc.

Grantchester (2014) s05e06

This episode serves as a possible pilot for sixth “Grantchester” and a second full season for new vicar Tom Brittney. Lots gets resolved, both in regards to recent events and season-long subplots. The show’s sparing in the schmaltz, instead going for knowing smiles and warm feelings, and it feels as good as a show about murders in a small British city in the fifties with characters who are becoming woker than most shows set in the modern day is ever going to feel.

Possibly because Brittney finally lets his guard down. The episode opens with him doing a degenerate drunk routine at his mom’s party. Mom Jemma Redgrave is marrying rich dipshit Dominic Mafham. Brittney disapproves, hence the drunkenness. So he spends the first third of the episode hungover, as he and Robson Green track a dead woman to a strange convent run by authoritarian Tracy Ann Oberman, who enrages and intrigues Brittney. He can’t understand how she does what she does in God’s name or some such thing. Sidney’s been gone so long I’d forgotten “Grantchester” used to regularly have crises of faith. Brittney’s been a rock this season, until last episode. So, broken, he involuntarily gravitates towards Oberman.

Oberman’s a good foil for Brittney. She’s unpredictable and rather cagey; her interrogation scene is almost a femme fatale thing, which is weird considering she’s just out of the habit.

Then there’s the Leonard (Al Weaver) plot. His dad—a perfectly fine but nothing special Sean Gilder—comes to visit and things don’t go well. There are unexpected revelations and dashed hopes and it’s all very depressing until it isn’t anymore because you don’t want to be depressed going out on the show this season. No spoilers but… it’s a very nice ending.

“Grantchester” has been fairly busy this season and this episode does a fine job wrapping up all the existing storylines. It’s a little uneven balancing subplots for Brittney, Green, Weaver, and Peake-Jones—even with Peake-Jones getting a lot less—with Green’s stuff all at the beginning of the season, but it works well enough. “Grantchester”’s successfully navigated the vicar change… now it just needs to get renewed.

Grantchester (2014) s05e04

“Grantchester” is definitely not going to be one of those shows where they take out a lead character, drop in a replacement and it’s about the same. The show has been reminding Tom Brittney isn’t just a brunette version of departed ginger(?) James Norton, but it triples down throughout this episode. First, there’s so much with the class difference between blue blood Brittney and working stiff Robson Green. It’s foundational, with the showing opening on it—Green’s not just out of touch with the changing times, he’s now got the voice of the wealthy explaining behaviors to him, making excuses for them.

In some ways, it contributes to a big-ish blowout between Green and Brittney towards the end of the episode; Brittney’s become addicted to solving mysteries and Green’s worried he’s created a murder out of an accidental death. A truly unfortunate one involving LSD—which is just being developed—but apparently not a murder. Or maybe Brittney’s just distracted by his love life problems, which Green has a great time teasing him about.

Green also has a great time teasing Brittney’s love interest, Lauren Carse, about their burgeoning romance, not knowing it’s run into hiccups due to Brittney’s chastity. Brittney comes up with a solution this episode, so he thinks, but not one Carse is interested in because it’s all about Brittney’s religiosity. And there’s the other way he’s so different from departed James Norton—this episode goes hard on challenging Brittney’s religious beliefs.

Like when he tries to tell the scientist he’s living the capital T truth and the scientist—doing the LSD experiment for psychotherapy—just rolls his eyes at him; Brittney takes it as a challenge, the scientist means it as a dismissal. Juxtaposed with that religious challenge, Leonard (Al Weaver) and Mrs. C (Tessa Peake-Jones) have a lovely little subplot about Peake-Jones miserable having left her war profiteer husband and not wanting to lay it out for Weaver. Instead, she just tells him God doesn’t care if she’s happy, which gets Weaver hitting the good book for proof otherwise.

Then there’s Green’s whole home situation with mother-in-law Paula Wilcox, which blows up in unexpected ways to Green (though maybe not wife Kacey Ainsworth), which ends up giving Green some great character development, modern husband stuff to do.

The show gets in a lot of cultural commentary—between Carse and Ainsworth as working women, the treatment of Wilcox, the pre-anti-drug LSD, college students from the colonies—there’s a lot going on with the times and the characters. “Grantchester”’s pushing forward, embracing the fifties’s societal changes.

Bummer the show aired on Brexit day, as it seems entirely opposed to isolationist, patriarchal jingoism.

Oh. And they do a 16mm film strip but it’s really obviously video and it seems like they don’t employ anyone who knows how to fake the look. But “Grantchester” has definitely shown it doesn’t need Norton’s love stud of a vicar to succeed.

Grantchester (2014) s05e03

Lots ends up happening this issue, even as the episode starts with Tom Brittney getting returned mail from his estranged mother. In fact, there’s going to be something for everyone this episode—except Leonard (Al Weaver); Leonard is background.

Will (Brittney) doesn’t just have a murder case—a very Sherlock Holmes affair involving a murdered cinema projectionist and a Brown man (Hamza Jeetooa) in fifties England, the sins of Empire being revisited and such—he’s also started regular dating reporter Lauren Carse and there’s still more with troubled youth Jim Caesar. Robson Green’s mostly just on the case, though he figures into the Caesar stuff and has his own home situation brewing as mother-in-law Paula Wilcox starts causing problems Kacey Ainsworth (Mrs. Robson Green) can’t ignore. Nice stuff for Ainsworth and Wilcox with the subplot.

But the biggest subplot, which ties in to mystery man Jeetooa, is for Tessa Peake-Jones. What starts as an adorable story arc for Peake-Jones and, to a lesser extent, husband Nick Brimble, turns very, very serious and Peake-Jones does a phenomenal job with it. There’s some other excellent acting in the episode, with mystery storyline damsel Zoë Tapper going from stereotype (at least what “Grantchester” is willing to do as a historical stereotype) to a full-fledged character as the solution unveils.

The Sherlock Holmes comparisons don’t stop with the mere presence of Imperial subject Jeetooa, but also how the murder (you’ve got to wonder if writer Jake Riddell was being intentional or if it was all subconscious) gets discovered, and in some of the plot details… like rocks through the windows as clues. Just feels very Conan Doyle. Except, obviously, everything else about it.

Like Brittney and Carse’s romantic thread, which survives the hiccup of jealous copper Bradley Hall, but goes very discomforting, very serious places. Just when you think Brittney’s going to be the stable stud vicar.

And Ross Boatman might be getting more important; he runs the gym where Brittney boxes and where Caesar is supposed to be rehabilitating through positive social and athletic structure.

“Grantchester”’s getting some big developments without having to make its likable characters, you know, unlikable. Well, some of them but certainly not like it’s done in the past. It’s definitely got solid footing this season.