WOW #10
Full Swing, Adolescence
My first ten WOW’s, I can’t believe it! 30 mini reviews and so much wonderful feedback from everyone who has kindly taken the time to read them. I am truly grateful to you all. Your enthusiasm continues to encourage me to keep going.
To celebrate reaching this little milestone, here are my 10 favourite shows I have reviewed so far:
Shrinking - WOW #1
Hacks - WOW #2
Say Nothing - WOW #3
The Dog House - WOW #4
Amandaland - WOW #5
Big Boys - WOW #6
The White Lotus - WOW #7
Virdee - WOW #8
Toxic Town - WOW #9
Adolescence - WOW #10
Something for everyone there I reckon!
This week’s titles might sound like innuendos but one is a swish golf docu-series; another and the other is a gripping crime drama which could be in line for one of the best shows of 2025, and it’s only March! (Sorry just two this week as I’ve been nursing a nasty cough for the last few days).
Full Swing
With the huge popularity of the Formula One docuseries - Drive To Survive, it made total sense that Netflix would look at how they could repeat this success across other sports. As a massive tennis fan, I have to admit I was disappointed by Break Point, something about it just didn’t quite work. They didn’t have access to all the big stars and I think a lot of the drama fell flat to me as I follow the sport, so despite the dramatic editing, I knew how the matches ended which took the air out of it all somewhat. However, Full Swing totally succeeded where it’s tennis sibling failed.
Big players from the world of golf are everywhere in this series. Household names like Rory McIlroy feature alongside rising stars like Matt Fitzpatrick and Sahith Theegala. Unlike the tennis, I knew nothing about the world of professional golf before I started watching this, except that Tiger Woods (as a player) is a legend. The timing was also perfect for them as when it began filming, it was all kicking off in the world of golf, with the launch of the controversial LIV tour which caused divisions and tensions that still run deep now the show is in it’s third season.
Even though the politics of LIV vs the PGA has now been mostly resolved, there is still plenty of drama in this latest series, including a very surprising arrest of the world number one, and seemingly least likely to ever get into trouble type of person, Scottie Scheffler and McIlroy’s personal life draws media attention when he’d rather they were talking about his golf. Qualification for the Paris Olympics is high on many of the players priorities as well as redemption for an unsuccessful Team USA performance at the Ryder Cup in 2023. But for me the episodes I really enjoy are when they focus on some of the lesser-known players stories.
In previous seasons I discovered characters like the family man Tony Finau whose golf career always comes second to his wife and six children or the charismatic Joel Dahmen battling his new found fame to stay focussed on his performance. This season continues in this vein with particularly poignant episodes featuring Gary Woodman returning to the sport after having brain surgery and Camilo Villegas finding comfort and support in the golfing community after suffering a tragic loss.
I promise you, you don’t need to know anything about golf to enjoy this. I think the key to it’s success is it’s ability to make these extremely rich and competitive men feel human, even relatable at times. I have learned that golf is as much, if not more a mental game, than a physical one and the production team have found a way to transform this into captivating drama. The unique access they get to the players both by following them playing on tour, but also in getting them to open up, draws you in. I can’t wait for more Ryder Cup (taking place later this year in New York) drama in Season 4.
Series 1-3 are all available to watch now on Netflix
Adolescence
Simply, this is a masterpiece of television. Four episodes, each one filmed in a single take with no cuts, no trickery. Stephen Graham and Jack Thorne, who both featured in my last WOW for their work on A Thousand Blows and Toxic Town, come together to create and in Stephen’s case write and star in this must-watch, totally unique drama for Netflix which has already recorded over 1 million viewers in a single day this past weekend.
Graham collaborates with director Philip Barantini who he has worked with before on another one-take project, the film Boiling Point which was set in a bustling restaurant kitchen. Previously, Barantini had thought it would be too complicated to adapt the ‘one-er’ formula to work for a multi-episode series, but through weeks of planning and hours of rehearsals, they cracked it. Usually I would be put-off by this, often it can feel more like style over substance but in Adolescence the unflinching camerawork becomes intrisic to the plot. The unbroken nature of the filming style, forces you stay with the uncomfortable content on screen. The camera cannot cut away and therefore neither can you as the viewer.
Watch the making of Adolescence here
The story about a 13 year old boy (played spectacularly by debutant Owen Cooper) who is accused of stabbing to death his female classmate is fictional, but feels like it could have all too easily been ripped from the headlines of any modern British newspaper. It is not sensationalised, there are no last minute twists or big reveals. Just four snapshots in time showing the ricochet effects of how a tragic event like this could have happened and how it impacts everyone around them.
I haven’t stopped thinking about this show since I finished it, and despite it’s difficult subject matter, I want to watch it again because it is just such a flawless piece of television. Thorne & Graham, as well as the rest of the cast - standout performances are given by Ashley Walters as the arresting detective (Top Boy) in the first two episodes and Erin Doherty (A Thousand Blows) who is breathtaking in the third, have been out in force promoting the piece. They hope the issues raised will at the least spark conversation and at the most lead to questions in Parliament and societal changes that are so desperately needed to protect the youth of today.
All episodes are available to watch now on Netflix