All Creatures Great and Small
Feelgood TV. Watch it!
If you liked The Durrells, even if you loved (and remember) the original show from the 70s, you'll love this one. I watched it last month and found it heartwarming and very low-key entertaining. After dealing with Covid, Trump and all that shit going on in recent years, this feels like hot cocoa on a winter night. Can't wait for the second season.
Offsite Linkby Anonymous | reply 38 | Last Monday at 3:34 PM |
The guy in the middle is kinda hot
by Anonymous | reply 1 | 10/26/2020 |
My late mother loved the original series (as do I). I'll look forward to seeing this.
by Anonymous | reply 2 | 10/26/2020 |
I watched All Creatures Great & Small faithfully on PBS, growing up and I don’t recall a thing about.
by Anonymous | reply 3 | 10/26/2020 |
I hate heartwarming and very low-key entertaining.
Offsite Linkby Anonymous | reply 4 | 10/26/2020 |
The books are good too. Call the Midwife with animals.
by Anonymous | reply 5 | 10/26/2020 |
Loved the original series. But this looks good.
by Anonymous | reply 7 | 10/26/2020 |
I grew up in rural western New York in the 70s and 80s, my family had a small farm with livestock (cows, sheep, horses), chickens, ducks, turkeys. We also raised Labrador Retrievers, as my father was a duck hunter. We watched All Creatures weekly on PBS, it was one of few things we did together that didn't involve arguing and resentment. There were countless scenarios that resonated with us - not just the health of animals. Small towns, farming communities, the shut-in, poverty and ignorance, people who never ventured more than a few miles from where they were born...all these experiences added to the charm and drama of small-town life. It took us out of ourselves, gave us noble pride in the idea of a simple way of life. I'm reminded that Thomas Jefferson, despite his accomplishments as an architect, statesman, scientist, mechanic, builder, and inventor, continued to identify first as a farmer.
I'm a city dweller now for more than 25 years, but when the family gets together for holidays and birthdays, we still get a laugh when we recall the rich old lady and "Trickie-Woo." I don't miss mucking out after the livestock, or endlessly fretting over broken fences, but I do miss marking the seasons with beekeeping chores, and the way light played on the pasture and woods. The show gave me and my sibs a sense of dignity in the way we spent our youth: were were too busy for silly things, too preoccupied with chores to plan ambitious futures. Still, we all managed to pursue meaningful careers.
"All Creatures" is hands-down the finest television depiction of that kind of life, and it is timeless.
by Anonymous | reply 8 | 10/26/2020 |
Sorry, but I have no use for some stupid remake. Are there going to be "people of color" unrealistically populating the little valley in Yorkshire? I go out of my way to boycott unnecessary remakes. They unfairly erase the originals in the public consciousness.
by Anonymous | reply 9 | 10/26/2020 |
This has played and OP is right. Charming, very much in the Durrells canon. Must say Timothy and Prunellas' son has aged very well.
by Anonymous | reply 10 | 10/26/2020 |
It's quite beautiful. And it features Dame Diana Rigg in her final role.
[quote] If you liked The Durrells,
Callum Woodhouse played Leslie Durrell. In All Creatures Great and Small he plays a bratty douchebag who tries to redeem himself to get his older brother's approval.
Nicholas Ralph, playing the protagonist James Herriot, sure is cute.
Matthew Lewis (Neville Longbottom from the Harry Potter films) is a regular who is in love with the woman James Herriot has a crush on. Plust Herriot kills his horse (drama!).
It features some of the best countryside shots this year.
by Anonymous | reply 11 | 10/27/2020 |
New one on Masterpiece tonight in the U.S.
by Anonymous | reply 12 | 01/10/2021 |
How wonderful, OP. Thanks for letting me know.
I read all of the books and watched the original on PBS the small tv while the rest of my family watched whatever else was popular at the time. Your post immediately took me back to the time when I was dying to get out of small town USA and go see the world--even if it was small town Great Britain...
by Anonymous | reply 13 | 01/10/2021 |
Is this a dollface thread?
by Anonymous | reply 14 | 01/10/2021 |
Loved the books and the original series. Not interested in this remake. The original was the best.
by Anonymous | reply 15 | 01/10/2021 |
Give it a shot, r15. You might be pleasantly surprised. I was.
by Anonymous | reply 16 | 01/10/2021 |
Great and evocative post, R8.
by Anonymous | reply 17 | 01/11/2021 |
I watched it and the Yorkshire dales are breathtakingly beautiful. The scenery is like porn.
Also I want the new Tristan to pound the shit outta me.
by Anonymous | reply 18 | 01/11/2021 |
You are right R10 — I’ve always had a soft spot for Tim & Pru’s son. A gorgeous voice. Unexpectedly sexy on such a slight frame.
by Anonymous | reply 19 | 01/11/2021 |
Neville Longdick is in the show.
by Anonymous | reply 20 | 01/11/2021 |
Watched the first episode last night and was a bit disappointed. Sweet-intentioned as it is, it was so damn predictable in plot and characters.
I love the lead but I was wish he was surrounded with a more interesting ensemble. The older vet and his housekeeper are too young and attractive....those roles would be better served by more interesting character actors. The girl who plays (what I assume will be) the love interest seems ok but her hairstyling is atrocious and distracting. Not her fault, of course, but I think she will be hard for me to love (I'm shallow!).
Diana Rigg looks a little "out of it" in the previews, but we'll see. I do look forward to Callum Woodhouse, who I really liked in The Durrells. And speaking of The Durrells, I wish this series was as quirkily cast and played. The landscapes are indeed breathtaking and there are worse ways of spending Sunday night....I hope it improves..
by Anonymous | reply 22 | 01/11/2021 |
A reminder to all fans to tune in tonight for Episode 2!
by Anonymous | reply 23 | Last Sunday at 1:50 PM |
I loved the books and the original miniseries. I think this edition is quite good so far. And yes, the scenery is like porn.
by Anonymous | reply 25 | Last Sunday at 2:03 PM |
I once was at an art exhibition of the turn-of-the-century Danish artist Vilhelm Hammershøi in a London museum and recognized Samuel West there: he was wearing a completely ratty old sweater with huge holes in it. (I think hhe was trying to look inconspicuous, but the huge holes in the sweater made him look all the more noteworthy.) He was looking at me recognizing him, and so he tried to avoid me--I actually felt awful he was trying to avoid me (I had no interest in talking to him once I had spotted him, because I would have had nothing to say: "Uh, I remember you from 'Howards End'" is not a very interesting thing to say to someone.) I tried to avoid him, but I kept ending up in the same rooms as he was in--it was kind of awful. I wanted to see the exhibit, not him; but once you spot someone you know from TV in a public space, it's hard not to gawk.
by Anonymous | reply 26 | Last Sunday at 2:12 PM |
Something about the writing in this series is very off. Not up to Masterpiece Theatre standards, if you ask me. Pretty scenery, delicious leading man, but that's about it.
And the Masterpiece Mystery that preceded it and debuted tonight, Miss Scarlet and the Duke, was even worse. Horrendous (again, the leading man, a hunkier Hugh Jackman-type, was quite delicious)!
by Anonymous | reply 27 | Last Sunday at 6:18 PM |
[quote] The Ghost of Alistair MacLean
Offsite Linkby Anonymous | reply 28 | Last Sunday at 6:22 PM |
I like the writing. It's very low key, very unpretentious. I cannot believe I am so moved because a cow is about to die.
by Anonymous | reply 29 | Last Sunday at 6:28 PM |
r28, that's Alaistair Cooke, not Alaister MacLean.
by Anonymous | reply 30 | Last Sunday at 8:01 PM |
I was surprised at how much Samuel West looks like Robert Hardy, who played Siegfried in the original.
by Anonymous | reply 32 | Last Monday at 7:21 AM |
[quote]Diana Rigg looks a little "out of it" in the previews
Probably a reason for that.
by Anonymous | reply 33 | Last Monday at 7:21 AM |
Diana Rigg appears so much older than those other great Dames, Maggie Smith and Judi Dench. Sadly, very frail.
by Anonymous | reply 34 | Last Monday at 11:15 AM |
You know she's dead, right, r34?
Did anyone else watch the "LGBT Thriller" B&B starring Callum Woodhouse?
by Anonymous | reply 35 | Last Monday at 12:31 PM |
I did not. I just looked it up on IMDb. I find the trailer confusing, but I am intrigued.
Offsite Linkby Anonymous | reply 36 | Last Monday at 2:03 PM |
Is the alternate title I'm Not Running a B&B Here?
by Anonymous | reply 37 | Last Monday at 3:29 PM |
I know Diana Rigg is dead. But Dame Maggie could keel over tomorrow and I'd still say she looked a helluva lot healthier in her final days than Dame Diana.
by Anonymous | reply 38 | Last Monday at 3:34 PM |