The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Season 5
Jun. 25th, 2023 10:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
canyonwalkerHawk and I have enjoyed watching The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, an original TV series streaming on Amazon Prime. Just recently the 5th and final season dropped. ...Well, recently may be a misnomer. It dropped on April 14, and though we've been waiting more than two years for season 5 (season 4 came out in Feb 2021) we were so busy in April and May that we only just noticed it finally was available a few days ago.
Season 5 is the show's final season. Showrunner Amy Palladino and Amazon have both been clear about that. Palladino also acknowledged that the show was spinning out too far from its original narrative arc— see my criticism after watching Season 3— and pledged that season 5 will focus more tightly on the title character, "Midge" Maisel, and her struggles to balance building a show business career with her family and society's patriarchal expectations of a woman circa 1960.
So, how does season 5 do? Well, first, I've only watched 5 of the 9 episodes so far. (In two days, though!) Second, I'm going to keep this spoiler-free.
Many of the episodes in s5 start with a flash-forward. We see a scene with Midge, her (grown) children, and/or her ex-husband Joel 20 years later.
I think these flash-forwards are a mistake. On the one hand they tell intriguing vignettes of where Midge and the minor characters landed 20 years later. On the other hand they continue the show's weakness of introducing new subplots that stray too far from the main narrative story of Midge's rise and struggle. Also, while all the minor characters are convincingly "aged up" 20 years, either with makeup or by being recast with older actors, Midge does not look 20 years older, and that's very jarring.
As for the main body of the episodes... the jury's still out. The show continues with very high production values. There's always been beautiful staging and costumes. The characters are all interesting and well acted. And the script continues to be full of sharp, witty dialogue. It's so witty it actually becomes a suspension-of-disbelief problem. During S5E1 I paused the show to exclaim, "Is there anybody in this drama who is not a sharp-witted, sharp-tongued critic of everything around them?"
But... and you knew there was a "but" coming, right? Season 5 remains isn't fixing the spinning-out-of-control problem. It's still very enjoyable to watch, and it's spinning out fewer new subplots than seasons 3 and 4, but it's still keeping lots of plots spinning and introducing a few new ones, too. And the pacing is ponderous. At episode 5 little over a month has elapsed in the story of season 5. Again, the show is enjoyable to watch in the moment, but at the same time I grow increasingly skeptical that show will able to deliver in the remaining few episodes a satisfying and fitting dramatic conclusion to Mrs. Maisel's marvelous story.
Season 5 is the show's final season. Showrunner Amy Palladino and Amazon have both been clear about that. Palladino also acknowledged that the show was spinning out too far from its original narrative arc— see my criticism after watching Season 3— and pledged that season 5 will focus more tightly on the title character, "Midge" Maisel, and her struggles to balance building a show business career with her family and society's patriarchal expectations of a woman circa 1960.So, how does season 5 do? Well, first, I've only watched 5 of the 9 episodes so far. (In two days, though!) Second, I'm going to keep this spoiler-free.
Many of the episodes in s5 start with a flash-forward. We see a scene with Midge, her (grown) children, and/or her ex-husband Joel 20 years later.
I think these flash-forwards are a mistake. On the one hand they tell intriguing vignettes of where Midge and the minor characters landed 20 years later. On the other hand they continue the show's weakness of introducing new subplots that stray too far from the main narrative story of Midge's rise and struggle. Also, while all the minor characters are convincingly "aged up" 20 years, either with makeup or by being recast with older actors, Midge does not look 20 years older, and that's very jarring.
As for the main body of the episodes... the jury's still out. The show continues with very high production values. There's always been beautiful staging and costumes. The characters are all interesting and well acted. And the script continues to be full of sharp, witty dialogue. It's so witty it actually becomes a suspension-of-disbelief problem. During S5E1 I paused the show to exclaim, "Is there anybody in this drama who is not a sharp-witted, sharp-tongued critic of everything around them?"
But... and you knew there was a "but" coming, right? Season 5 remains isn't fixing the spinning-out-of-control problem. It's still very enjoyable to watch, and it's spinning out fewer new subplots than seasons 3 and 4, but it's still keeping lots of plots spinning and introducing a few new ones, too. And the pacing is ponderous. At episode 5 little over a month has elapsed in the story of season 5. Again, the show is enjoyable to watch in the moment, but at the same time I grow increasingly skeptical that show will able to deliver in the remaining few episodes a satisfying and fitting dramatic conclusion to Mrs. Maisel's marvelous story.
