Although The menu has no relationship with Carnival Rowthe film directed by Mark Mylod may lead to an analogy. In it, each dish is served as a result of the combination of different factors. An idea, a concept arrives at the table, which integrates everything desired and shows it in a harmonious way. That, just that, the exposition of various issues without disorder, does not happen in the series of Amazon Prime Video.
Carnival Row, since its first season, presents an urban fantasy story in which human beings and creatures are in a constant pulse. It is one of the symbolic appetizers that history raises: the conflict between different. This is a path that leads to other places: the tensions between power, the recreation of an elite and the look that special beings have on others.
Within those axes there are different layers. Some related to the internal drives of each character and others associated with interests of the environment in which they find themselves. An individual and collective power game in which Philo (Orlando Bloom), as a detective, and Vignette Stonemoss (Cara Delevingne), embodying a fairy variant, try to save their bond without betraying their communities.
Carnival Row
The second season of Carnival Row brings together a handful of good intentions based on a dialogue between the universe of human beings and creatures. But the development of those ideas is weak, as is the growth of its characters. The result? The end of a series that leaves the sensation of having greater potential, although its staging was not entirely satisfactory. Its protagonists, Orlando Bloom and Cara Delevingne, embody several of the fragile aspects of the production, without significant growth and with moments that could have been more epic and profound.
Carnival Row and the good intentions
One of the main objectives of Carnival Row it is to make the creatures a social allegory of those communities or individuals that do not fit within different standards and are confronted by their environment. Philo is a kind of link between the two, the ideal look that dreams of a better coexistence.
His will emerges as a point of hope in the story, while solving mysteries and breaking objects with the heads of his adversaries. However, the representation of his intentions, his concept, brings together multiple stereotypes that do not completely fit. He is the detective, like Sherlock Holmes, who must also seduce and show kindness, at the same time that he needs to know how to hit and allow himself to heal deep wounds after having a drink.
The result? Following the analogy with The menu, a dish in which there are so many flavors and textures that it is difficult to taste it. It is not the only case in which this occurs. But the most visible being the protagonist of the story. He embodies different aspects that Carnival Row it does not finish developing, leaving its ceiling low in relation to its aspirations.
The presence of Vignette Stonemoss is lost in that context. The character is light within an environment of beasts and men, until she goes out and mutates into a darker and more pragmatic version. Isn’t that what happens with so many people outside of fiction? It is a valid question that between various distractions you lose weight.
the class struggle
When the previous weakness is taken to a collective plane, the pulse between communities and classes loses strength. Both are threatened by something beyond their strength and they are incapable of establishing any kind of alliance. So, it is valid to repeat the previous question with a twist: isn’t that what happens with so many societies?
In these types of messages, Carnival Row find a reflective tone that may work. Although something similar to what happens to its protagonists occurs: among so many good intentions, the idea of balancing with various variants between human civilization and the fantastic occurs in a weak context, full of leaks and leaks.
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That explains that the high points of the second season of Carnival Row they do not have the rotundity that could be imagined; neither in terms of epic nor philosophical depth (there are no great dialogues or estimable phrases). The irregular construction of characters contributes to not reaching the levels of expectations that were imagined, in addition to an ending solved in a bit of a hurry, like someone who wants to get something off their shoulder that has just fallen, probably motivated by the cancellation of the story.