Steven Bracewell

I finally accepted Clive Owen as Sam Spade, his delivery of an American accent was off in my opinion, but I worked through accepting that's the best we can do these days for something close to Bogart. The pace was moody and slow at times, but I can live with that, I can even relax and enjoy it. The characters were many and varied, the English subtitles at times not able to keep up with the rapid paced French slurred gutter gibberish that passes for a language, that's ok, I've got rewind. I absolutely loved all the old cars, they might be my favorite stars in this production. It was all going great, a trip to 1950's France, post WWII and still feeling the effects of the Algerian revolution. It's all starting to come together at the end. Then in the last 15 mins of the final episode they go full on DEI, bring in the charming Alfre Woodard who somehow just sits all these soldiers, spies, detectives and criminals - all of them killers - into a room like a bunch of naughty school children. Then scolds them into submission. As though the mere presence of an African American female, charming and imperious as Alfre may be, is sufficient to bring this dangerous collection of 1950s characters into line. To me it seemed a lazy way to check the politically correct boxes and end this whole moody depressing journey to nowhere. Shame on Clive, the writers, directors and producers for finishing an artistic sculpture in marble with a plastic 3-D printed head. Sigh....