Stunning and clever special effects abound in this young adult fantasy witch-based drama, adapted from the Sally Green novels by Giri/Haji writer Joe Barton.
What a title! In the interval between hearing about The Bastard Son and the Devil Himself and seeing it, that sentence rolls around the brain like a rock. An eight-part play created by Joe Barton, who previously wrote Giri/Haji and The Lazarus Project and is therefore just as popular right now as TV writers, The Bastard Son & The Devil Same is about a teenager in the center of a war within the European witch community, and is based on a trilogy of light but popular novels for young adults. Too many TV series have similar origins, but if the writer's identity whispers that this is a different beast, the title screams it.
Stars: Jay Lycurgo, Nadia Parkes, Paul Ready
The bastard is Nathan, who is 16 years old and, since he was a little boy, has been the subject of fierce curiosity: the "beautiful born" witches suspect him of being a dangerous "blood warlock" like his absent biological father Marcus, who once came to peace talks. between the born righteous and the bloody, he turned into a wolf and killed all the delegates of the born righteous side. When the Soul Leader comes to town it means trouble, but it also means his daughter Annalize is the new girl at Nathan's school. Nathan and Annalize, lovers not so much star-crossed as blood-spattered, hit it off.
As an outbreak of carnage suggests Marcus is on the move and violent tension between the blooded and the justborn intensifies, the show's range of magical gubbins is pleasingly eclectic. Dusty vapors are inhaled, seductive powders are nonchalantly blown from palms up, and spells are cast with a poke and an incantation. These ancient and sacred wonders are combined with the timeless and profane art of hand-to-hand combat, which sometimes turns into the unglamorous vision of a man trampled down en masse.
The Bastard Son can be witty or brutal, leaving indelible marks on the memory when Barton's imagination and source material are combined with the flying crimson of stunning special effects. An early stunner is a glimpse of a past murder, where we don't get to see the victims being ripped apart, but we do see objects in his kitchen strewn about and we see his blood seeping through the cabinets. The series' signature visual motif is a classic: a human body bulging, then ripping apart, then separating into floating layers of clothing, skin, viscera, veins, and bone before crashing wet to the ground. If part of the mandate of shows like this is to make horrific deaths confusingly beautiful, The Bastard Son continues to paint fine canvases.
Meanwhile, with Barton as series creator and head writer, the series can be relied upon to succeed in the mundane business of narrative structure, without undermining its own mythology too much and burying us under a heap of expository dross. A potentially confusing first episode is handled neatly, with a yes-let's-go-on-with-the-episode-two-thanks twist neatly placed near the end. Then, once Nathan's journey has been given room to gain momentum, the timeline jumps back just as the story threatens to become too linear. As the halfway point approaches, a change of location to Paris and the introduction of Emelien Vekemans as French repairman louche Gabriel widens the view, again at the right time.
However, what is all this about? Fantasy series thrive on subtext, but The Bastard Son can be light on that. For the most part, the persecution of bloods by the born righteous is a prosaic reaction to an atrocity: honestly, you commit a lycanthropic massacre, and it's the only thing everyone talks about, rather than a deep lore about an atrocity. faction whose devouring hatred carries allegorical weight. However, this could be because Barton didn't like the forceful symbolism of the original book, where instead of the born righteous and the blooded there are the jealous and abusive whites and the persecuted and hated blacks.
In Barton's version, he makes many other changes, merging elements from all three Sally Green books into a single, more streamlined story, the strongest themes being parenting and childhood, as the traumas of youth define adults whose search for their own identity means escaping influence. from a bad father figure, or learning to live without the guidance of a good one.
Watch The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself 2022 Trailer
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