Our Flag Means Death. It's utterly brilliant and I am obsessed!

[TriceratopsRocks]

I'm sure I found a thread on this series a while ago, but now season 2 is out I've looked back and I can't find anything apart from the renewal petition.

For anyone who hasn't come across it yet, I would thoroughly recommend. It starts off as a sort of workplace comedy set on a pirate ship, sort of in the style of Ghosts, and with a similar fanbase to Good Omens. When the 2nd lead character arrives at the end of episode 3, it starts to change and it only hit me two thirds of the way through season 1 that I was actually watching a very different sort of show to the one I thought I had started watching.

From that point it's phenomenal. The attention to detail is superb. Both leads are clearly neuro diverse, from abusive backgrounds and damaged because of these. They both want what they think the other one has. It's about them discovering themselves, accepting themselves for who they really are, and healing. There is comedy, but also heartbreak and despair. The show handles these so sensitively and accurately, down to minute details, and Taika Waititi and Rhys Darby deserve every award under the sun for their work here.

I don't think I've ever obsessed about a show as much as this one. I've tried to make this not too spoilery in case some of you want to watch it, but really I just want someone to talk to about it! I've already watched it countless times and the more I rewatch the more I appreciate it. I said I was obsessed and I really am!

The show has sadly been cancelled, despite its popularity, and the producers are currently trying to see if it will be picked up by another network. I have read that they are keeping an eye on the iPlayer numbers as part of this, so I also wanted to shamelessly plug it here 😁

If any of you haven't seen it and fancy giving it a try, it grows into itself in the first season and you really need to give it at least 4 episodes (episode 4 is where the main story really starts). Its not a show I would have thought to watch myself (DD wanted me to watch it with her) but I'm so glad I have.

I don't really know what I want from this thread really. I want more people to find it, but I also want to just talk about it and obviously can't do that without more spoilers than I've already given. Help me out people!

What is this an extended scene of? I can't watch it for some reason- Instagram won't let me!

In the final episode, there is a sequence where the crew don English uniforms while Al Stewart's 'Roads to Moscow' plays. In the broadcast version, it starts with the bare English bottom and Stede putting on a jacket, then Jim and Archie share a kiss and Ed throws clothes to crew who are out of shot. Then it cuts to the crew walking out of Spanish Jackiez in their English uniforms. The extended scene was a single take showing all the crew getting ready inside, finishing with Ed grinning at Stede then moving out of shot, and Stede giving a glorious wink, before his expression changes to one showing the full weight of responsibility he is feeling. It's his plan, and the lives of the crew are at stake here. It was meant to be a parallel to "The Chain" sequence in S1, but much of it had to be cut due to time constraints. Samba posted the full sequence on his instagram, which is the link I posted above. If that doesn't work directly, here is the general link to Samba's instagram. If you can open this, click on 'Reels' and it's the first one:

https://www.instagram.com/sambaschutte/

Quoting this one again, because I found one of the interviews with David Jenkins I mentioned. I thought it a good read.

https://www.avclub.com/interview-david-jenkins-our-flag-means-death-season-3-1850953527

Well against all expectations my husband stuck with the show and we will be watching the final two episodes tomorrow evening with a nice bottle of wine.

He did ask me a few days ago why I had started watching and I showed him the opening post of this thread. He said it was very well written and thought that it would have brought quite a few people to the show until I told him that Mumsnet flows very fast and any post drops off the front page very quickly.

I think I will feel a bit bereft after we have finished (I did try to eke it out but really just wanted him to see why I love it so much). I will continue to rewatch but he is not somebody who watches anything more than once.

I do wish that the final episodes weren't so rushed. If I am completely honest I feel they are two of the weaker episodes (my opinion only obviously) despite having some lovely scenes (breakfast in bed for example). Most of all, although I love Taika, I wish they had shortened the scenes with the fisher folk at the beginning of the final episode so they could have fitted in that wonderful sequence of them all getting ready to fight the English. At least it allowed me to discover Roads to Moscow which is not something I had heard before.

Thank you so much TriceratopsRocks for brightening up the last few weeks with this lovely show.

Ah thank you, I've now been able to watch it! Awesome scene!

Just finished watching the series (both seasons) thanks to the recommendation on here. Thanks for that, OP! Also bingeing on fanfic obvs.

Definitely a bit uneven in places but the good parts are so very good. I liked the humour too. Nothing like sharply veering between tragedy and comedy (the music theatre episode was particularly good).

I somehow missed the fact they were in Barbados at the beginning and was gritting my teeth slightly at HBO's idea of an "English" pirate accent (and reminiscing about "Spike" back in the day...don't think I've enjoyed anything this much since Buffy) then the penny dropped re the accents and all was OK.

Apart from the obvious parts, I think my favourite was the incredibly awkward scene with the two retired female pirates. What was the message there? "This is our future if we don't pull yourselves together"? Or "Wow, we aren't even that messed up compared to these two"?! Loved it. I'm going to get the giggles in every slightly sticky social situation thinking of some of the scenes in this show.

And Stede's "death".

I don't even like violence or bloody stuff normally but they trod such a fine campy line and it was obviously ketchup...

Wonderful.

Oh dear, edited that twice and still got an error.

Oh well, hopefully makes sense.

Thank you so much for your lovely message. I'm glad your DH stayed with it to the end :) Mine isn't one for rewatching either, but I long ago gave up trying to get him past Episode 1. We often end up watching different TV and just have a couple of things that we watch together. I totally understand the bereft feeling. But fanfiction does help. I read an absolutely beautiful one this morning about how Ed and Stede keep finding each other in different lifetimes.

I do agree about the last two episodes, but now I know them I am much happier. Breakfast in bed, the lovely letter, the beach reunion... I will definitely keep watching this show, and I'm so glad my OP brought you on board 😊

Nice to have more people in our crew !

Just watched the last episode of S1 (again), and going to watch “Fun & Games” later .. I just love the scene on the Sofa, especially Ed angrily shouting “expected me to melt back into your arms as soon as you pop your fucking head up”

Chapter 1 of my fan fic about a published on “archive of our own” .. not putting the link in here, as trying to keep my lives seperate ! If you find it, hope you enjoy it

Ahoy there @Phineyj welcome aboard! And you are a Buffy fan too! I am in currently in the middle of a Buffy/Angel rewatch - something I have to do every two or three years (I'm on BufS5/AngS2 - have just watched 'Darla'/'Fool for Love', which is one of my all time favourite episodes). Spike is definitely my favourite character in that show. I felt my OFMD obsession was verging on the unhealthy so I forced myself back to Buffy for a while 😆

I also love Stede's 'death' in S1E10. I'm a big Mary fan so that is a favourite episode, and their fuckery is sublime. The Anne Bonney/Mary Read episode is also wonderful, and because of David Jenkins' comments I wondered if that was part of the set-up for S3 - Stede and Ed both have some growing up still to do, and how do they stop themselves ending up like that? Stede has given up his pirate dream to be an innkeeper. Will Ed feel guilty about that? But I'm positive it was all going to work out, and we'd have a wedding. S2E4 also gave us the couch scene and Button's transformation too. I loved Ewen Bremner in that episode. Anyway, so glad to have you with us. This show is too good not to have a bigger audience!

"How do they stop themselves ending up like that"?

I must say as a married person in my 50s, I watched that scene with a number of winces of recognition. I mean, we don't go in for the physical violence, the pyromania or the leather but the argument over cooking dinner seemed awfully familiar 😂.

Ah, right well, I haven't really got time for a full Buffy and Angel rewatch, but I might have to dust off Once More With Feeling.

And whichever episode Spike says Out.For.A.Walk..Bitch.

Thanks for the memories!

I must try to get DH to watch.

I think he'll get upset for Ed though.

Any scene involving a big cat, a runaway carriage and a dropped piano is going to make me overlook a lot of shonky "sea".

It's been reminding me a lot of Northern Exposure too. Chris the DJ would fit right in. Just needs an appropriate New Romantic shirt.

They have obviously missed a trick here.

They should totally run a pub.

A floating one! Any annoying patrons could go straight over the side.

Well done, Onions. I totally understand about keeping your lives separate, although it means I won't know if I ever read it :) I only requested an invite to AO3 this morning - I'm hoping that being able to log in will help me save/organise my favourite fics and find new ones. I'm also going to seek out some Buffy fic - I never really knew much about fan fic back in the day so I have a whole new world to explore there too. Not sure I'll get time to try and write anything myself for a while though; and I haven't tried to write a 'story' since I was at school, so I've no idea if it's something I could even do.

I'm definitely getting ready for another full OFMD rewatch though - it's been a few weeks now that I've been getting by on individual scenes, Tumblr and fan fic. Although I did watch S1E9 last week - after I posted the Act of Grace clip I just had to see the whole episode...

If you log into Ao3 it remembers the history of what you read. Makes it easy not to lose stuff.

I think tbh I should have watched the actual show a couple of times through before getting sucked into multiple chapter fics. I am now a leetle bit confused about what's canon and what's not!

Although I can't think of a nicer way to spend the Easter holidays tbh.

😂I wonder if married women in their 50s are a specific/unexpected part of the fandom for this show. I mean, that's me too. But I guess with leads like Taika and Rhys looking and acting the roles like they do, it's understandable!

And Once More with Feeling is my number 1 Buffy episode. Last year I listened to the soundtrack album a couple of times a week for about 5 months as it exactly filled a regular car journey I was doing. Never got tired of it. And I loved Northern Exposure too - haven't thought about that show in years!

Hehe definitely! I think that might be an easier set up than the inn they have planned - particularly in that rather dodgy looking shack they have. And it's a nicer way to deal with dodgy clientele than Jackie'z nose jar!

That sounds exactly what I need. Hope my invitation doesn't take long to come through :) Not really sure why you need to request an invitation to the site, rather than just being able to create one.

I think any form of delay cuts down on illwishers. They had a DDoS attack a while back.

Now the nose jar seemed like the kind of thing you might have found under Dave Lister's bunk in Red Dwarf.

I liked Spanish Jackie a great deal. She reminds me of some of my teaching colleagues 😁.

I suspect women in their 50s are the bedrock audience of a lot of these shows and that the advertisers know it...

Well this one is well into her sixties!

Went back to episode one today - the change in Stede from beginning to end is just incredible.

I was a big Buffy fan back in the day.

I shall start again at the beginning forthwith and pay attention properly this time. Maybe shut the cats out as they kept miaowing over key bits of dialogue...

Watched Fun & Games, and then had to watch “Curse of the Seafaring life” .. I just love the end “You wear fine things well”, and then the handhold ❤️