u/PixelVapor

This is a revised version of the previous Twin Peaks waterfall post, with a more peaceful vibe.

A peaceful way to spend your time in Twin Peaks

Half Man has aired 2 of it's 6 episodes via HBO and somehow the hype marketing we have seen on Tik Tok differs wildly with what is presented here. This is no romance. It's a love letter.

To whom it's addressed will become painfully apparent over the next few hours.

Gadd and Bell are onscreen for maybe 5 minutes of the entire first episode. Gadd doesn't seem human here/ He makes low grunts that sound digitally pitched down, like a Rick Astley filter. He looks like Trainspotting-era Robert Carlyle crossed with Blanka from Streetfighter 2. All cartoonish and over the top. This could easily be signalling early on that Gadd may be a ghost, but if not it seems like bad direction as it immediately takes us out of reality. For the first five minutes of a drama it's a bit risky.

As are the 30+ year old actors playing teenagers.

Just. Too. Distracting. And the inability of the main character to act without any agency (things just 'happen' to him a lot. A bit like Donny in Baby Reindeer. No spine) is just very difficult to watch.

All I'm going to say is that Richard Gadd has, thus far, built his career on our audience assumption that he was a poor wee Scottish lad bullied by a nasty old Scottish lady.

But after watching the first two episodes it's hard to see anything other than the fact that Baby Reindeer was a work of fiction, and we have all been had by Gadd's previous portrayal of himself as a meek, timid and sensitive soul.

Half Man itself resembles a failed ITV comedy with some uneven tone shifts (because, dear reader, this ITV comedy sometimes thinks it's a primetime drama) and uneven performances. Think 'Begbie - The Wonder Years' as directed by Gregg Araki and you may be on the right track.

A lot of the story beats are lifted directly from the un-filmed portions of Irvine Welsh's novel Trainspotting, especially those passages concerning young Francis Begbie's repressed views on homosexuality, his relationship with his alcoholic father and ultimately his masculinity he wears like a protective mask.

Basically it's nothing new. But Half Man really hopes you've never heard of Trainspotting or Francis Begbie, so that it can sell you this concept as 'brand new' but it has been done before with more wit, more brevity and more nuance than Half Man has the ability or sensibility to deliver.

Half Man has aired 2 of it's 6 episodes via HBO and somehow the hype marketing we have seen on Tik Tok differs wildly with what is presented here. This is no romance. It's a love letter.

To whom it's addressed will become painfully apparent over the next few hours.

Gadd and Bell are onscreen for maybe 5 minutes of the entire first episode. Gadd doesn't seem human here/ He makes low grunts that sound digitally pitched down, like a Rick Astley filter. He looks like Trainspotting-era Robert Carlyle crossed with Blanka from Streetfighter 2. All cartoonish and over the top. This could easily be signalling early on that Gadd may be a ghost, but if not it seems like bad direction as it immediately takes us out of reality. For the first five minutes of a drama it's a bit risky.

As are the 30+ year old actors playing teenagers.

Just. Too. Distracting. And the inability of the main character to act without any agency (things just 'happen' to him a lot. A bit like Donny in Baby Reindeer. No spine) is just very difficult to watch.

All I'm going to say is that Richard Gadd has, thus far, built his career on our audience assumption that he was a poor wee Scottish lad bullied by a nasty old Scottish lady.

But after watching the first two episodes it's hard to see anything other than the fact that Baby Reindeer was a work of fiction, and we have all been had by Gadd's previous portrayal of himself as a meek, timid and sensitive soul.

Half Man itself resembles a failed ITV comedy with some uneven tone shifts (because, dear reader, this ITV comedy sometimes thinks it's a primetime drama) and uneven performances. Think 'Begbie - The Wonder Years' as directed by Gregg Araki and you may be on the right track.

A lot of the story beats are lifted directly from the un-filmed portions of Irvine Welsh's novel Trainspotting, especially those passages concerning young Francis Begbie's repressed views on homosexuality, his relationship with his alcoholic father and ultimately his masculinity he wears like a protective mask.

Basically it's nothing new. But Half Man really hopes you've never heard of Trainspotting or Francis Begbie, so that it can sell you this concept as 'brand new' but it has been done before with more wit, more brevity and more nuance than Half Man has the ability or sensibility to deliver.