Director: Yann Demange
Spoilers. The final part of E4's week-long zombie epic finds all the characters united inside the Big Brother house at last, now that Riq (Riz Ahmed) has completed his perilous journey to find girlfriend Kelly (Jaime Winstone). Unfortunately, despite crowds of zombies swarming the compound gates and news that the disaster is a global event, producer Patrick (Andy Nyman) still decides to put everyone's lives in jeopardy with his selfish determination to escape the BB cretins...Like all good zombie stories, it's the living's reactions to the grim chaos that provides the heart of their apocalyptic fantasies. Part 5 wisely focuses on the human drama for the first 15-20 minutes, as the housemates decide to restrain Patrick in the bathroom to prevent him risking their lives with his harebrained escape plan. Tragically, Patrick's cynicism about the housemates proves unerringly accurate, as he convinces Joplin (Kevin Eldon) that his "friends" secretly detest him, and will already be plotting murder in the other room. In a neat scene reflecting the voyeurism of Big Brother, Joplin watches his fellow housemates through a two-way mirror, and realizes Patrick's pessimism is well-founded.
An alliance is made. Patrick and "Judas" Joplin making their swift escape by holding the housemates at gunpoint, so they can drive a van through the perimeter fence fast the zombie hordes. In the episode's one dip into silliness, their escape tactic is patently flawed, as Joplin is quickly overwhelmed by zombies once he opens the fence – and both escapees are unable to outrun the undead and get into their van. There begins a tense, fatalistic 10-minute climax, as the Big Brother house is quickly overrun by zombies and the characters fight against these insurmountable odds. The series' most disgusting sequence is saved, deservedly, for the foulmouthed Patrick – who's dismembered and eaten alive in gruesome, jaw-dropping, darkly humourous detail.
As the housemates are besieged and "turned" into zombies, Kelly and Space (Adam Deacon) become the only ones left – the former locked in the Diary Room, the latter in the video Gallery. With grim predictability, Kelly asks Space to open the door so she can go out fighting, embracing a last-stand with no chance of success. A jump-cut forward in time finds all the housemates prowling the compound as slobbering, white-eyed zombies, amongst the crowd that were once their enemy. The final scene is one of beautiful pathos: Zombie Kelly staring up at a Big Brother ceiling camera, half-remembering her life before.. Indeed, Dead Set ends on the perfect satirical stinger: zombies watching zombies on TV.
In summation of the week, I still think the first few episodes didn't provide the right balance of satire and horror the concept deserved, but once Dead Set spread its wings everything became smoother and more enjoyable – if slightly conventional. Ironically, only after reality TV became an unmentioned backdrop did the satire begin to trickle through. The last two episodes were particularly clever in balancing clichéd zombie dilemmas while poking the ribs of reality TV.
The actors were all very good, particularly Nyman as Patrick (who was wasted in the early episodes, but dominated the latter half brilliantly), Winstone's Kelly (who oozed plucky determinism), Ahmed's Riq (who benefitted from having a tangible goal and direction throughout the run), Eldon's Joplin (who performed well, but undermined believability because he's a recognisable face), and the revelatory performance by Davina McCall as her zombie alter-ego. Davina was so good, I've almost forgiven her gurning and fake enthusiasm throughout 9 years as Big Brother presenter.
As a five-night special, the format undoubtedly worked. I'm not convinced Dead Set needed three hours to tell this story, but the nightly showings definitely combated illegal downloads (well, from the native audience.) The immediacy TV viewers demand these days was catered for by this scheduling decision, and its success bodes well for Torchwood, too -- which will air its own 5-episode season on consecutive nights next year. Is this the future of television, then? High intensity marathons, culminating in a DVD release for latecomers?
Overall, writer Charlie Brooker definitely turned things around after a wobbly start. I suspect Dead Set will work better in one big sitting, but it was certainly a successful Halloween treat from E4, that will hopefully open the floodgates for more intense, creative genre programming.
31 October 2008
E4, 10pm
Cast: Jaime Winstone (Kelly), Andy Nyman (Patrick), Kathleen McDermott (Pippa), Kevin Eldon (Joplin), Riz Ahmed (Riq), Liz May Brice (Alex), Warren Brown (Marky), Shelley Conn (Claire), Beth Cordingly (Veronica) & Adam Deacon (Space)
