Spoilers

Will answers be revealed?

This is it? This is the end of season 1? I don’t quite know what to say. I hate dunking on stuff. I’d much rather write about things I’ve loved, or at least liked. Throughout this season I’ve been concerned at the narrative structure, at the sense that character development was occurring in a way which didn’t leave us, as viewers, with much understanding of why people were acting the way they were acting.

This episode is the season in microcosm.

Julie’s bizarre outburst at an inappropriate moment whose significance is then literally explained to us is a prime example – a character whose action makes so little sense and contributes so little to the story that another character is given a paragraph to explain why they’re acting the way they are.

Not only that but as with the season as a whole we learn almost nothing about the world they’re in. Every piece of information is drip fed as if we might explode if we get a proper explanation of what’s going on. For me the double injury here is that this is the season finale and it felt like episode 2. We don’t even end on a cliffhanger but instead finish as we have done in so many of the other episodes – with something happening but without any real clear context as to its significance, how it came to be or what we should be thinking about it.

This is tremendously disappointing.

Nothing is bad in itself. The cast continue to deliver meaningful moments but they’re not being given the best to work with.

Once again those who present as female are put in the background or exist only to provide motivation to the male presenting characters.  From falling down a hole to acting out to being selfless so the men survive there’s no point at which a woman makes a significant decision either about her own life separate from a man or in a way which will impact upon the world and her place within it.

I particularly love Elizabeth Saunders as Donna, but she is given almost nothing to do.

This too is tremendously disappointing.

I don’t know whether there’ll be another season of From. I am not convinced it will find an audience because there’s so little for us to root for.

In summary, colour me frustrated. This could have been so much more. If it had landed its ambition in its plotting and had a commitment to tell a meaningful story in its first season I think it could have been in line to go much further. As it is I suspect I won’t give another thought to this show from the moment I finish writing this review.

Rating? 5 out of 10

Stewart Hotston