Our Flag Means Death - Thread 4: Roll up, roll up! Come join us for more pirate obsession!

[TriceratopsRocks]

Ahoy again mateys! Can you believe we are now aboard thread 4? Stick around for chat about this brilliant show, its cast, its music, fan edits, fan fiction and more than a little obsessing over our fabulous leads - pictures extremely welcome!

If you haven’t yet seen Our Flag Means Death, what are you waiting for? Go watch it (on BBC iPlayer), then come back and join us 😀

You may have heard that this is a comedy about pirates and think it's not for you. But it’s actually a show about self-discovery, healing and found-family with a love story at its heart. The joint leads are both damaged by abusive backgrounds and want what the other has. The show is about their healing and their respective journeys. It’s tender, romantic, funny, emotionally intelligent and utterly refreshing. It subverts genre expectations. There is comedy, absurdity and a good amount of heartbreak and despair - sometimes in the same scene! The acting is outstanding (Taika Waititi and Rhys Darby especially). But the writing, music, costumes, sets, the sheer attention to detail – for a show with only 18 half-hour episodes it is still keeping us talking, three full threads and many re-watches later.

If you think this might appeal, do watch it and come back and talk to us. It would be lovely if more were to join our crew. But be aware that it's a show that needs time. It’s structured like a theatre production, with a prologue and 3 acts. The 2nd lead arrives (briefly) in episode 3. Episode 4 is the start of Act 1, where the tone changes and the main story begins. You need to give it at least 4 episodes, and from there it just gets better and better. It still took me several more episodes to fully appreciate what I was watching, but by then I was hooked and had to immediately watch it all over again. And again. And again! If you like Good Omens, What We Do in the Shadows, Ghosts or even Bridgerton, this might well be the show for you.

(I’ve kept this spoiler free, but if you scroll down you will no doubt find many, so beware!)

Thread 1: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/telly_addicts/5008593-our-flag-means-death-its-utterly-brilliant-and-i-am-obsessed?reply=135294204
Thread 2 : https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/telly_addicts/5076581-our-flag-means-death-thread-2-still-utterly-brilliant-and-we-are-still-obsessed?reply=136060611
Thread 3: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/telly_addicts/5101662-our-flag-means-death-thread-3-its-still-utterly-brilliant-we-are-still-obsessed?reply=137315706

Given the game is called 2048, I reckon there's only one picture I haven't seen, but of course I'm going to have to keep playing it until I do 😁. They have definitely chosen some lovely photos of him.

David Jenkins tweeted this earlier today and there is now a huge amount of wild excitement and speculation about what 'available' might mean and what if Netflix bought our show?

Also threads of people listing the show-adjacent merch they've bought from etsy etc to show Netflix what a potentially lucrative fandom the show has. My mind is now boggling with the possibilities of transmogrification bowls, break up robes, shower curtains and innumerable lighthouse, mermaid and kraken/octopus themed items. My favourite is 'a pattern to sew my own seagull'. Aren't OFMD fans amazing! Any network would be lucky to have us.

David Jenkins on X: "@netflix hmu about another two season comedy that’s available 😘" / X

Over 8,000 #OFMD tweets today!

@lizziesaurusx i saw this too. I messaged Netflix on their official show request form. You can request they consider hosting up to three shows per time.

I asked for:

Our Flag Means Death Season 1

Our Flag Means Death Season 2

Our Flag Means Death Season 3

See what I did there? 😁

help.netflix.com/en/titlerequest

Excellent, and well done @MrsJellybee . We don't have Netflix atm, but I'll take a look to see if we can still request something. Did you also see David's tweet about how he's still asked about the billboard and thinks it's awesome? And so many tweets re his Netflix comment. It's raising hope again.

Well, I shall hope for the best, expect the worst, and fill in the form!

They can pick up S1, remake S2 (the Jenkins cut - how it was supposed to be before the budget cuts and episode cuts) and then make S3 for us 😁
Just love how the fandom are still here, absolutely not going anywhere. The show was trending on X again after David’s tweet 🥰

@TriceratopsRocks David’s comments had everyone clowning 🤡
It shows other streamers know the power of the fan-base.

I like this comment too about engagement rate:

An hour ago…

Awesome. It shows how the fandom never left. Someone must realise the value in that, surely?

The fandom trend on command 🥰

It wasn't exactly a command - 'twas the merest whisper. And we all went bonkers 😁

@TriceratopsRocks 😆 David knew exactly what he was about. He saw the trending power of last month’s trailer anniversary. Pirate Daddy whispered his command and the fandom responded 🥰

I did that too but didn't think of S3 - excellent idea! I've just done it again - it seems to let you do repeat requests. @TriceratopsRocks it let me request without logging in so you should be able to.

And he's just done it again! Wouldn't it be wonderful if he knew something he just couldn't tell us yet?! I don't want to get my hopes up but it's hard not to start dreaming...

@lizziesaurusx I just came here to post about this. What is he up to…?

Oh I so so hope he's actually up to something! Surely after all that feverish excitement yesterday he wouldn't have tweeted that most recent one and raise our hopes if there was no chance at all?

Wouldn't it be lovely if in a year or so we were settling down to watch season 3 and posting on thread 25 of this one 'do you remember that weekend we were messaging netflix and then we got the news...?'

@lizziesaurusx it’s the ‘would be’ not ‘would have been’. Simple conditional (I think) instead of present perfect. It suggests future possibility rather than past hope now ended.

Ahhhhh!
(Reading too much into this…)

Oh wow. I log on to find this? I have to say, I'm struggling to dampen my hopes atm. Why would he tweet if he didn't know something? He knows the power he has over the fandom. He told us before, very clearly, when he considered it the end of the road for the show. It's hard to convince myself now that that is still the case, when he has started tweeting about it again like this.

Arghhh- I too came here to post this - oh my actual god…. Could this even vaguely, possibly, remotely be happening, about to happen, have a possibility of happening? Those on twitter could you keep us posted pls 🙏🏴‍☠️🥰

Well it's trending again - nearly 8,000 tweets! As a writer he definitely knows that his use of the conditional rather than the present perfect will be pored over and analysed to the nth degree, and he knows how much the fandom will emotionally invest in even the tiniest sliver of hope, so it's got to be very much intentional and significant, surely??

Also, Friday's tweet was about Netflix taking on S1 and S2; today's is explicitly talking about S3 - quite a step up to express that if it's just a wild hope rather than a solid possibility.

Aaaargh even just typing this feels a bit ridiculous - all this hope out of two very short tweets!

I refuse to be drawn in. I'm not giving my heart to Netflix to be savaged.

Besides, I've found a currently updating fic set on Bake-Off so plenty to be getting on with.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/58528840/chapters/149107627

(Disclaimer: I have only read the blurb so far)

Manifesting…