‘The English’ Loses a Compelling Emily Blunt and Chaske Spencer Two-Hander in Convoluted Web of Grievances: TV Review
There’s a great show hiding inside the convoluted plots otherwise obscuring “The English.” From writer and director Hugo Blick (“Black Earth Rising”), Amazon Prime Video’s new limited series taps Emily Blunt (also an executive producer) and Chaske Spencer (“Banshee,” “Sneaky Pete”) to play Cornelia and Eli, an especially odd couple who forge an equally unlikely and unshakeable bond out in the dusty, unforgiving deserts of the American West. Together, these two characters and actors alike prove more than enough to drive the series forward — and yet, Blick continually throws more and more complications into the mix, packing the season’s six episodes with easily 10 hours worth of material.
From her first blazing scene to her melancholy last, Blunt brings her singular combination of warmth, wry humor, and flinty determination to the role of Cornelia, an English noblewoman hellbent on seeking revenge for her dead son. As conflicted Native American Eli, Spencer ably balances her out with a monotone stoicism that belies the roiling emotions motivating him to succeed in his rapidly changing homeland, on his own terms or not at all. Every time the two of them are onscreen, I could happily sit back and let their chemistry and stories take the wheel. Every time they aren’t, though, the series inevitably loses narrative steam as it works overtime to justify the detours.
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On the one hand, if you can get the kind of supporting cast “The English” ends up with, I understand the instinct to give them all enough to do in order to show off more of their skills. As Cornelia and Eli make their way northwest, they encounter everyone from a villainous Ciaran Hinds and Toby Jones pairing, to Gary Farmer and Kimberly Clarke of “Reservation Dogs” as a nefarious couple, to Rafe Spall and Nichola McAuliffe in the kind of deliciously melodramatic roles that both clearly relished the chance to play. On the other hand, the many, many secondary characters crisscrossing Cornelia and Eli’s path simply don’t have enough time within the confines of this limited series to make huge impacts. More damning, though, is how much explanation is needed to contextualize them all, which keeps breaking up the show’s rhythm to frustrating ends.
And so for as much promise as “The English” has, and the consistently beautiful — if strangely pristine, given the brutality constantly at hand — Western landscapes bookending every scene, “frustrating” ends up the word most fitting to describe the series at large. Typically, I’m not one to recommend that a show drag its narratives out any more than necessary, but in this case, the overlapping stories end up too ambitious for the time Blick has to tell them. Sometimes, all you really need to tell a good story are the basics. With only six episodes to unpack everything, “The English” would have been better off significantly narrowing its focus to its greatest strengths: Blunt, Spencer and the unusual ties binding their characters’ quests for justice together.
“The English” premieres Friday, Nov. 11 on Amazon Prime Video.
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