I had great expectations of 'Roanoke'. Mixing a genuine American mystery - the disappearance of the Roanoke 'Lost Colony' in the 1580s - with the tropes and trappings of contemporary docu-drama and reality television seemed like a promising conceit.
What a pity the final product - especially in its latter stages - proved to be such a tiresome mess. After establishing an intriguing dynamic between the 'real' characters and their on-screen dramatised incarnations, the last few episodes descended into a genuinely tiresome hunt-and-slash format. The reason why slasher movies and visceral horror movies are so short is that the blood-and-thunder shock- factor diminishes VERY quickly. It's just NOT sustainable, dramatically, over successive episodes.
The dreadful array of 'English' accents presented by several cast members is also worthy of comment. Kathy Bates is a fine actress - one of the best - but her 'Butcher' was largely incomprehensible: inflections varying from Manchester, Yorkshire, Newcastle and Cockney. Utterly inconsistent, and unintentionally comic. At least her vocal stylings can be put down to her being a good actress PLAYING a bad actress. The same 'excuse' presumably applies to Wes Bentley - who appeared to be vocalising a Monty Python character. The same cannot be said of Sarah Paulson, whose accent though BETTER was still unconvincing. The word-salad provided by the earnest London fan in Episode 10 topped them all - a virtual tour of the UK, phrase by phrase. Evan Peters, on the other hand, wasn't bad. Not altogether convincing, but at least consistent. this is a popular show in the UK and many dramatic scenes were utterly spoiled or reduced to comedy by the blathering nonsense coming out of some of the actors' mouths. I can only imagine that the silly 'contagious Foreign Accent Syndrome' sub-plot on Murphy's other show, 'Scream Queens' is a reaction to audience response to this avoidable distraction.
The weakest season, so far. Must do better.
What a pity the final product - especially in its latter stages - proved to be such a tiresome mess. After establishing an intriguing dynamic between the 'real' characters and their on-screen dramatised incarnations, the last few episodes descended into a genuinely tiresome hunt-and-slash format. The reason why slasher movies and visceral horror movies are so short is that the blood-and-thunder shock- factor diminishes VERY quickly. It's just NOT sustainable, dramatically, over successive episodes.
The dreadful array of 'English' accents presented by several cast members is also worthy of comment. Kathy Bates is a fine actress - one of the best - but her 'Butcher' was largely incomprehensible: inflections varying from Manchester, Yorkshire, Newcastle and Cockney. Utterly inconsistent, and unintentionally comic. At least her vocal stylings can be put down to her being a good actress PLAYING a bad actress. The same 'excuse' presumably applies to Wes Bentley - who appeared to be vocalising a Monty Python character. The same cannot be said of Sarah Paulson, whose accent though BETTER was still unconvincing. The word-salad provided by the earnest London fan in Episode 10 topped them all - a virtual tour of the UK, phrase by phrase. Evan Peters, on the other hand, wasn't bad. Not altogether convincing, but at least consistent. this is a popular show in the UK and many dramatic scenes were utterly spoiled or reduced to comedy by the blathering nonsense coming out of some of the actors' mouths. I can only imagine that the silly 'contagious Foreign Accent Syndrome' sub-plot on Murphy's other show, 'Scream Queens' is a reaction to audience response to this avoidable distraction.
The weakest season, so far. Must do better.