ALICE AND JACK. WED AND THUR 9pm - ch 4 - tv pace. No spoilers

[Blondeshavemorefun]

I’m sure I did a thread for this but can’t find it

starts tonight. On wed and thur for 3w

Alice, played by Andrea Riseborough – yes, the Andrea Riseborough of Academy Award-nominated notoriety (https://www.digitalspy.com/movies/oscars/a43777187/oscars-changes-andrea-riseborough-controversy/) – meets Jack, played by Domhnall Gleeson, with all of his About Time (https://www.digitalspy.com/movies/a509440/about-time-review-richard-curtiss-directorial-swansong/) romantic-lead kudos.

If you loved Gleeson in that Richard Curtis gem, you will probably fall for him in this, since he's playing much the same sort of bloke.

Jack is an awkward but adorable lab scientist who becomes utterly besotted with spiky female finance-bro (sis?) Alice, who resolves to keep him at a remove the length of several bargepoles.

After the pair spend the night together, Alice unceremoniously asks him to leave and never contact her again.

So far, so romantic. We then scoot forward a couple of years and find Jack has had a child with the rather warmer Lynn (Aisling Bea).

Then Alice calls and the wheels of ill-fated romance are set in motion

The six-parter has been ambitiously billed as a "love story for the ages". That might be a stretch, given that the mood of Alice & Jack is utterly at the mercy of melancholic Alice, helped along by an earnest strumming score which at times feels fittingly bittersweet and at others is reminiscent of hotel foyer music.

As the pair's offbeat and somewhat unlikely connection bubbles away across the years, the question of the piece becomes why is Alice so determined to push Jack away? When the answer comes, the melancholia only quadruples.

I’m liking it (admittedly, I haven’t seen all the episodes that have been broadcast), but given that I’m not really a tv person, and just happened to flick it on by accident partway through the first episode (when Jack was putting on his sock at the corner), it kept me gripped. I love the long, slow takes, and what it looks like, and I’m interested in both characters.

True, @purpleme12 .
I'm wondering if she might just happen to get pregnant at the same time and Alice will disappear for the next eighteen years to Siberia....

I have watched at tv pace so seen four episodes. Cuba has been mentioned twice in episode 4 - well Cuba once and 'a random encounter on the other side of the world' was also referred to.

I thought I must have fallen asleep and missed it at some point. So the Cuba scenes are still to come? The story is illogical enough as it is without them jumping backwards and forwards in time...

You are right the it was mentioned in episode 4
But the post referred to was posted before episode 4. That's why I said it
But now episode 4 has been on

But there were no scenes set in Cuba were there? It's been mentioned but we don't know anything about what happened in Cuba.

No
I didn't report that post myself because it just said about Cuba rather than any actual spoilers like the previous spoiler post (I did report that one)
But it's still TV paced so shouldn't be mentioned till it's been on

I just watched episode 4 and was confused by Cuba! I just feel like this could have been so much better, an actual exploration of people who are in the wrong relationship and the impact that can have.

Right, I've finally caught up.
Superficial, unimportant stuff first - I'd like to know her lipstick shades and where she gets her nice navy jumpers (she seems Me+Em style).

Agree the daughter going round was unrealistic but she's probably heard her mum complain about Alice over the years.

I'm surprised at both Lynn and Jack in terms of being bitchy to each other etc. I thought he'd be better than the seeming crap dad in the early years..

Telling women he's in love with someone and they're just love with him.. eyeroll fgs. I now think they're both just fooling themselves by staying 'safely'out of the relationship while convinced they're madly in love. Reality is it wouldn't work out or, maybe it would now as she seems much more stable, so why not give it a go rather than resigning themselves to this. It's like the like the drama of the painful love.. I like the new woman, let's see.. they seem more believable now all these years later.

Is anyone getting mildly stressed by the amount of nipping about fairly extensive tracts of London everyone keeps doing at the drop of a hat? I don’t remember noticing where Jack and Lyn’s marital home was, but his post-split house is in Forest Gate, and then he and Alice take the colicky baby for a joyless brunch on Brick Lane, then he drops the baby back to Lyn, and nips up to Parliament Hill to watch kites with Alice, and now he’s just sitting at home in Forest Gate and barking ‘Arnold Circus, half an hour!’ at Alice, who lives somewhere near Smithfield…?

I don't understand why they wouldn't have got together after she jilted Danny. She had recovered enough from her abuse to be able to almost marry a seemingly nice man. Seeing Jack again made her see she couldn't marry Danny but... then she didn't see Jack again for two years until she had an oil trading tip???

It's bloody stupid but I will still watch the last two episodes.

'Arnold Circus, half an hour' in a thick accent probably wasn't understood by every viewer as it isn't like saying 'station road' or Hyde Park. It's quite unusual as a road name.

Thick accent?

I haven’t even started this yet, but it’s gained quite a lot of posts.

Have suggested a @Blondeshavemorefun Recommends thread before. Tag everyone in the first post then add links to new threads which people can hook up with.

The good thing about this series is that it’s given me the push I needed to try writing my own screenplay!

Just seen ep 4 and the two mentions of Cuba . Would they do that if it hasn't been shown at all as a flashback ? Maybe it was a scene that was scrapped . Who knows .

Alice seems to have mellowed over the years but she's a complicated person . She sounded jealous when she kept repeating the name of Jack's new girlfriend .

Just joining as started watching this morning
On episode 3 and its maddening
They barely know each other right? He messes up his marriage, pines after her for YEARS, she invites him and he turns up to her wedding having nothing to do with her for years prior to that?
At least domnhall gleeson is charming

I’ve watched to the end. Cuba will become clear.

They learned to Salsa together?
They smoked cigars together?
They hired a cool car, drove around the whole county and had tea with Fidel Castro together?
Discover they are both deep dyed neo Communist comrades?
Or she has a secret life there as a charity worker/patron of Cuban ballet dancers and Jack sees she has a 💓....

Or they had some deep and meaningful conversation that somehow weaves together the rest of the patchy narrative thread....

Finally seen 4 so avoided till
Now

4 did seem Pointless

Daughter met Alice and now is a ballerina

Jack has 5 million

Alice is doing ivi

They are friends but no more ? But in love as he told the date over the table

Not sure what happened in Cuba but guess we will find out in 5/6

I don't understand why they don't get together

Or is it she can't do relationships

But she was going to marry Danny and peob would have done if she hasn't sent the invite

I watched about 20 minutes of the first episode and decided I wasn't going to stick it for a whole series, so I'm reading the thread through instead. Shame as I do quite like to save things up now and semi binge so I finish at the same time as the TV paced thread.

Reading people's thoughts though, I don't think it's one for me.

She's annoying but so is he

I went to know how it ends

I loved it, having finished it, but not sure which episodes have been broadcast, so wary of spoilering? Are 5 and 6 still to be shown?

Ok, in non-spoiler mode — what does combative, bullshit-averse, clever Alice see in a dimwitted laddish football agent with awful friends? How does Maya morph from PA to friend (while, conveniently, still appearing to fulfil the role of PA)? Did anyone else keep confusing Alice’s office with her apartment, given that both are approached from a lift down a similar-looking long, dark corridor? How does Alice manage to look like a ballet dancer in her grey marl tracksuit bottoms and hoodie, rather than an inmate in a high-security prison?

5&6 are Wed and thur this week

@DifferentAlgebra , come over to the Alice and Jack spoiler thread!