Its common to describe theBelow Deckfranchise asDownton Abbeyat sea.
That givesDownton Abbeytoo much credit.
Who writes this vapid self-regarding tripe?
Bravo
Oh, right, a Brexit-loving Baron with a seat on the House of Lords.
InBelow Decks fiendish version of reality, the guests are less characters than caricatures of ludicrous wealth.
The crew smiles for their brief masters and make fun of them in the confessionals.
Bravo
OnBelow Deck, the classy are trashy.
We are on the workers side, even as we pick our favorites.
The roles are well-delineated.
A new charter starts.
At best, the guests are chill.
At normal, they are full-service customers boozing past social niceties.
Is dinner starting on time?
Are clothes moving through the laundry room?
Can the chief stew organize a private beach picnic with lavish on-the-fly decorations?
Can the least experienced deckhand successfully throw the stern line during a textbook docking procedure?
Cameras seem to be everywhere, and the rapid editing cuts constantly between the cast.
The storytelling is almost entirely process oriented, which is presumably why workaholic auteur Steven Soderberghloves the franchise.
Here, the job is dominant.
The crew is exhausted but can never look exhausted.
There are short breaks that do not seem particularly relaxing: smartphones checked, cigarettes to smoke.
The latest season ofMedends Monday.
This year’s been a bit lacking in dynamic personalities, and not short of controversy.
The future looked bright when the Wellington started its season with an all-female management staff.
Chef Kiko Lorran was a perpetual ray of sunshine.
A cloud was forming, onscreen and off.
Dont underrate the secret sorrow of life in the middle, though.
Running on empty turned out to be the unexpectedMedmacro-narrative.
After Laras exit, Kiko impressed everyone with a 72-plate dinner.
She wound up expelled for a Valium incident that better experts than me have fully Zapruderd.
It doesnt take long to get exhausted.
It seems weird to pay big money so a show with huge cable ratings can insult you.
Maybe theyre vain enough think that they look awesome?
Maybe they just dont care?
The future ofBelow Decklooks as uncertain as the future of anything.
Yet the franchise has been a darkly funny balm in a bleak era.
How lovely to spend quarantine months escaping toSailing Yachts Greece,Meds Spain, andClassics Caribbean!
How much lovelier to see people in these lovely places descending into personal squabbles and personnel nightmares!
(Your shelter-in-place bunker doesnt seem so bad by comparison.)
Every now and then, a break between guest action leaves the yacht empty.
