Gavin and Stacey: The finale

[IHopeYouStepOnALegPiece]

A final final episode!

Fingers crossed they can go out with a bang but not sure!

Hotel weddings were totally normal by 2008. Don’t Tell The Bride had been going for years, full of people getting married in them. Even before venues were licensed for ceremonies, getting married in register offices as opposed to church was commonly done. I might just have very irreligious friends and family but I don’t recognise a world in which we’ve only moved away from church weddings very recently!

Just watched it, a little late, and while I don't think it was as funny as previous episodes really nice to see all the characters get their happy endings.

Unlike others I really found the Sonia/Smithy relationship very believable and relatable, cudos to the actor playing Sonia (Laura Aikman) for making the character a proper villain but not one dimensional. I think the show portrayed very well two quite insecure/needy people who were trying hard to play out the kind of relationship they thought they wanted and got themselves in over their heads and felt trapped, probably pandemic related too. I thought the show played out smithy 's character growth really well (obviously, as Corden is one the main writers), absent Dad, relies on Mick as surrogate father figure, insecure and embarrassed about his class and sexuality, who goes from attempted 'jack the lad' to wannabe grown up, trying to recreate the model of Mick and Pam as idealised couple/parents: traditional male 'provider', flashy show-home, conventionally attractive wife 'kept' by the man, but who isn't subservient, is actually just a tad bossy and sassy - that's what Gavin and Stacey basically are as well as Pam and Mick, and that's what Smithy tries to get with Sonia but without that core of warmth and love that the other couples have it just fails. Sonia doesn't get the same depth of development obviously but Daddy issues are hinted at plus she clearly needs a man with lots of dosh who worships her, she can feel superior to and who lets himself be controlled by her! But I like that the writers didn't go all the way to full pantomime villain with her and I like to imagine she got a happy ending too (after a ton of therapy!).

I always had smithy down as more ' cowboy ' bulider than a millionaire one, but given the prices they charge it's not surprising his done well and he has upped his game I suppose !
Good to see people doing well.
Sonia was very reminiscent of people I used to know who only wanted the veneer of the perfect life and wedding and not necessarily the man!

The ending reminded me a little bit of ' him and her ' with Russell Tovey , but that was much more brittle and harder characters than on G and S.
He has aged well I think

And he buys taps in bulk, for a very agreeable price

I enjoyed it. It wasn't always laugh it loud funny, but it was very good.

I have to agree the Smithy/Sonia relationship does seem improbable at face value and that the running out of the wedding very predictable, but that doesn't make it bad.

I thought the hen do was very well done in two fronts, firstly simply highlighting the chasm between Sonia + friends and Smithy's friends, but also when coupled with the foam party, just to show how they've aged and things have moved on. As Smithy said "who gets married at my age anyway".

Sonia was clearly going for the money / status aspect as many trades people do so well these days and he certainly seems more groomed lately than he did 17 years ago as well.
Plus there's always divorce and a settlement once she's tired of him being a grumpy old man too ( which i know is the cynical view )

What I love is how one night out can have
huge repercussions for two families - for years! Seen it play out myself. You meet a random at work or in a nightclub and the whole course of your own and your family’s life changes.

In my circles it’s the norm. My parents were married in a registry office in 1950. I and all my friends were in the 70s.

I think they had to make her almost pantomime villain levels of dreadful so we didn’t feel bad for her being left at the altar.

The conversation between clenched teeth about Smithy’s shoes was the clincher. Extremely well done.

It was brilliant. You could feel eyes rolling all round the country.

That was brilliant! Her radiant smile, while ripping into him.

I didn't think Sonia was that awful - I mean she wasn't nice but her main thing was that she just didn't fit with their tribe.
As different as the Essex and Barry lot were from each other, they both had a lot of acceptance of each other's quirks and they just 'fit'. Sonia was the outsider, the 'normal' person, who wouldn't 'get' Nessa giving everyone a tap for Christmas.

wasn't that Nessa's dad ?

Both Dads I think.

I think that was true in the first special she was in but she was more horrible this time.

Yes - I watched it again and you can see Gavin’s reaction. I think that was the moment he knew he had to say something

And also that we knew Smithy had paid for the wedding so we didn’t feel bad her dad had lost all that money

On Laura Aikman's Instagram post when she surprised her family, the Rev Kate Bottley commented that she presided over a wedding where the shoe thing actually happened!

The Sonia's of this world often find another mug to marry and provide the expensive live style she craves.
I didn't feel sorry for her , although what the other guests and Stacey's children would have done I'm not sure ( she asked Jason to keep an eye I think ?)
Maybe tucked into the salad at the buffet ( and the other beige rubbish as Gwen's neighbour once described the food at the christening !)

Life , not live !

The documentary is good
It's on I player and only 30 minutes but covers a lot of ground

Tbh, I found Sonia worse in the 2009 episode. Her entitlement was evident in the last episode but the subtle contempt in 2009 was cleverly introduced eg the dig at Nessa’s appearance, signing Smithy up to fat club, telling him not to drink much, being on her phone and the sneer at the taps - now I know that’s odd but DH’s family are a bit like that with gratitude. I could give them a tap and they’d be “aw, thank you!”. I’ve defo over thought the last episode!

Stacey asked Pete and Dawn to mind the kids

The eldest would only be a few months younger than Neil the Baby