After greatly enjoying The Cleaner — which, I’m pleased to say, I continued to really like after the first few episodes I wrote about in the post linked — I decided that I should really try and wean myself off mindless stupid YouTube videos and watch some more things with a bit of substance to them.
So I decided to take a look at Inside No. 9, which is a show I’d seen a number of people talking about, but knew absolutely nothing about. For some reason, I’d developed the assumption that it was something to do with politics (I think I’d made the unprompted mental leap from “No. 9” to “10 Downing Street” or something) and thus hadn’t really paid it much mind.
But then I saw this news story shared by someone I know. (Caution: The Mirror. Also spoilers.) If that was the kind of show we were actually dealing with… then I was absolutely, completely on board. I love this kind of gleefully experimental, darkly humorous stuff, and it seems like I’ve missed out on rather a lot of Inside No. 9 since it first aired in 2014.
I’m going to try not to talk too much about specifics of the show in this post, because it really is one of those series where the less you know what to expect going in, the more effective it is at what it does. So for now I’ll simply say that it is the work of Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton, two members of the League of Gentlemen, and it is some absolutely masterful television.
And I’ll leave that there for those who are sufficiently intrigued to check it out for themselves. It’s a BBC show, so you can watch it on iPlayer (or, presumably, BritBox in the States) and I think it has also had physical releases. Based on the three episodes I have watched so far, I have nothing but the highest praise for it, and highly recommend it.
For those who want to know a bit more and aren’t too concerned about mild spoilers (which I’m still going to try and keep to a minimum), I’m going to drop in a “read more” tag here, and you can join me after the jump to find out a little more if you see fit.
The concept of Inside No. 9, so far as I can make out from the three episodes I’ve watched at the time of writing, is that it’s a series of unrelated… vignettes, I guess you might call them, or short, half-hour plays.
The only connecting thread is that they depict what is going on inside some sort of property that is “no. 9” — i.e., flat number 9 in a building, or number 9 on a street, and so on. Aside from that, there do not appear to be any connections — yet, anyway, and I don’t know if there are any. Everything from the cast to the setup to the style in which the episode is presented is completely different from one installment to the next, and thus you never quite know what to expect.
The first episode, titled Sardines, features a variety of familiar faces from British comedy, including Katherine Parkinson, Tim Key and a number of others. The setup is that a rather well-to-do family appears to be playing a traditional game of “Sardines”, which is like hide-and-seek, except when someone finds a “hider”, they have to squeeze into the same hiding place as them, until everyone is all packed in the same place like the titular fish in a can of oily brine.
As the episode progresses, we are gradually introduced to a number of different characters both within and immediately surrounding the family, and a number of plot threads come to light. There’s a delightful sense of discomfort surrounding the whole situation; as you might expect, the very game of Sardines itself is naturally rather awkward and uncomfortable, but some of the acting (particularly from Key, who is incredible) really pushes the line of what one can watch without feeling too much second-hand embarrassment to not run out of the room screaming.
Another core thing that Inside No. 9 seems to do each episode is incorporate some sort of unexpected twist. In the case of the Sardines episode, one of the characters is not the person they were introduced to us as — and this ends up leading to a rather horrific, albeit implied, conclusion.
The second episode of the show is where I really started to “get” how experimental and interesting Inside No. 9 is, in that it’s a completely “silent”, farcical episode, accompanied only by diegetic music, sound and, in one small section, background dialogue from a television.
The episode depicts two parallel plot threads: that of a rich, middle-aged businessman having trouble in his relationship with a much younger woman, and that of two bumbling robbers attempting to steal a valuable (but worthless-looking) piece of modern art from the rich man’s home. Both threads gradually escalate as the episode progresses, until the entire thing concludes with a very surprising twist at the end — which happens to coincide with the only actual dialogue in the entire script.
Again, I’ll refrain from giving details — I’ve probably already said too much there — but this was an absolutely masterful piece of television. It did not give two shits about what you’re supposed to do with a half-hour of television; instead, it was gleefully rebellious and experimental, combining slapstick humour that wouldn’t have looked out of place on ’80s children’s television with oddly gripping wordless drama — and, in the closing act, some genuinely horrific moments.
Finally, from what I’ve watched so far, anyway, the third episode chronicles the situation of a young man named Tom, who is a primary school teacher who suffers a nervous breakdown and is helped through his situation by a homeless person named Migg after an initial exchange of good deeds bring the two together.
This is another one where to explain what made it so effective is to spoil it completely, so for now I’ll just say that, as someone who has been through something similar but not identical in my own life, this one hit very close to home in multiple ways. It was brilliantly handled — and once again, was totally different from everything that had come before.
After three episodes, I’m absolutely convinced. This is genius-level television, and I’m annoyed that I didn’t discover it sooner. Still, that does at least mean I can enjoy eight seasons of it now; apparently, after the as-yet unbroadcast series 9, the show will be taking an indefinite hiatus, appropriately enough, but I have a long way to go before that is something I need to worry about.
So yes. If you like deeply dark humour in that inimitably British sort of way, appreciate genuine creativity and artistic talent, I cannot recommend Inside No. 9 enough. Do yourself a favour and try to resist reading anything about it before watching (other than this post, of course) and you’ll have a thoroughly lovely (and possibly traumatic) time.
Sounds like fun, no?
I'm Not Doctor Who 