This Town BBC 1

[Aquarius1234]

This Town starts tonight 9PM bbc 1

I neve really got into peaky blinders but it's the same writer.
Period drama set in the early 80s. Part family drama, part political , part music scene.

He's soooo annoying

And Why is he so weird ?

And as if he'd suddenly be able to beat up like 4 blokes 🤦‍♀️

I'm carrying on with it as ep2 was slightly more watchable than ep1. But I'm not 💯 sold

I somehow thought it would have a this is England vibe, it's nothing like it

The Clash ❤

She is outstanding in this, the scene at the funeral so moving. Wonder if that was her really singing?

We get so used to actors and actresses generally playing the same character just with a different name and story that to see someone act a completely different role to what we're used to and do it convincingly was very impressive.

Agree with pp, seeing Dante an apparent mild mannered poet launch into a full on violent attack over a hat was a bit weird.

And I have to say the finger scene with the Reservoir dogs style gangster boss was a bit unnecessary .

Anyone else watching this to the tv schedule? Episode 3 last night . I like so much about this, the acting, the visuals, the characters of the young ones but between the psycho nightclub owner, the Ra and the skinheads, I’m just not sure I can.

I’ve finished the series. Be interested to know everyone’s thoughts.

Same, I was bored every time he came on screen, and I was just waiting for Bardon or Michelle Dockery to come back on again.

The first two episodes I really wasn't sure, but I persevered and I love it now. I can't say much of it is reminiscent of the two tone scene though. It mostly seems to be about skinheads and the IRA. I wondered if the two tone scene wasn't actually supposed to be developed yet and the kids in this band would be the ones to be in on it at the beginning. But then they kept referring to Two Tone, saying that's what they want to be part of, so it's obviously supposed to be a local thriving music scene already. But the music the main characters are writing and playing so far doesn't seem to have any Ska sound to it at all.

The storylines and character arcs are good though.

i do like Bardon / Barton, poor bugger

I could cry for Bardon. Poor kid.

It is meant to be 1981, so two years after the Specials had their first hit.

I've no clue what it's about I've only seen it in the tv guide.

Is it political? I'll not understand if it is.

I stuck with this, mostly because it's my era (though not my towns). Dante reminded me of half a dozen guys that I knew at university, assured of their own greatness! Thought that Michelle Dockery gave a depth to her character which was surprising.

Bardon was brilliant.

Not really. Nobody’s mentioned Mrs Thatcher by the end of episode two. Perhaps a vague awareness of the IRA and a couple of associated words might help.

I wsn't sure what year it was set, but the bit that confused me was that their band were singing songs that didn't sound remotely in the Two Tone / Ska mould, even though they kept talking about it. Until the very end of the final episode when they did their first gig, then suddenly they had that Two Tone sound, but I was wondering if it was ever going to come.

I thought that too.
the band were not very good as well.

One of the opening scenes was rioting, which I took to be the 1981 Handsworth riots.
If you go to i-player the BBC describe episode 1 as "1981, and Birmingham explodes. Dante, in love, wanders into a riot. He finds himself in a new world, surprising, dangerous, but full of opportunity."

However, I think the programme is taking the Hollywood attitude to history i.e. "I'm telling a story here, who needs actual facts and proper timelines?"

Although they talked about Two Tone, in the first episode, Dante had to ask his dad what a 'rude boy' was.

I would have liked to have heard more music, more gigs in pubs etc rather than just a big debut at the end. Bands do not work like that. It would have been good to see their 'scene' develop.

Despite the gripes, I loved the band and really enjoyed that part of it and like the characters of Dante, Jeanie and Fiona. The bit I did not enjoy was all the IRA stuff, it all seemed so cliched, the gruff talk by miserable souls who only seemed to perk up when they were talking about killing people or listening to rebel music

Dante is clearly neurodivergent but, as he seemingly did OK at school, it wouldn't have been diagnosed then he would just be 'a bit weird'. I've jumped ahead of TV pace a couple of episodes and it becomes more and more clear.

I’m just wondering why the security services chose an untrained black English soldier from Birmingham to infiltrate the Coventry cell of the IRA.
Luckily I don’t know anything about the music.
Somehow I’m still hooked.

It becomes both clearer and more complex as the series progresses, @WhatWouldJeevesDo.

If you’ve got to the end and it still doesn’t make sense, you may want to watch it all again. Maybe on a laptop through EarPods / headphones. I had to watch a couple of episodes on someone else’s TV and the sound was so appalling they were hard to follow.

Yes - I thought this from the first.
His brother probably is too.

Just finished this and nearly gave up after episode 1 but it did get better and better.
Lighting was really good - lots of street lights, red and green with the blue ultraviolet common in the clubs in the 80s. Lots of smoking which was again pretty common back then.

Just watched the first couple of episodes and it is right up my street. Just the usual annoying things of wavering accents and scenes jumping around the city. The scene at the funeral where they are at the church by the ring road and then in the graveyard that is the other side of the motorway just grates when you live in a place!

Ha! There was an amazing moment in Happy Valley where someone raced out of a court, ran past a post office and into a shop in Bolton, got on a bike and was instantaneously in a street in Leeds city centre!

I've watched 3 episodes so far. It's not really about ska / reggae bands at all although if does have a good soundtrack. In fact, there's a real misunderstanding of how band work and develop going on. There's a lot of hard graft and work behind the scenes