AMAZON PRESENTS HUGH GRANT IN 'A VERY ENGLISH SCANDAL'

Old Stuffy Music Covers A Risque Modern Romance 2018 Score: ***

Has a nice binging style for half of the three-episode series, after which it becomes much too obvious what the agenda is i.e. whose side the creators are on, with full steam. The supposed hired killers are keystone cops, shown so vapid and clumsy it's impossible to believe they'd ever be considered for the assignment had it been... assigned in the first place. Hugh Grant seems to be doing an imitation of Jeremy Thorpe or the template of Jeremy Thorpe being a hypocritical English Liberal Party member who is gay while trying to have his former gay lover killed...

If Grant played the role more naturally or likeable, or realistic, it might seem like he was taking the wrong side in the matter, which would be contrary to the ultimate conclusion that, once you see the old, contented, real life, openly-gay "victim" Norman Scott smiling into the same camera that'd shot the recreated quirky-drama, it's obvious that A VERY ENGLISH SCANDAL was, all along, one man's story and his story alone. The problem is: The best moments, during the show's addictive, rudimentary stages, had the old and young, powerful and powerless Jeremy and Norman each shown as flaky, flawed, desperate individuals and, for that, both were initially and equally intriguing. Meanwhile, the scene-stealing middle-ground is in Thorpe's shifty yet still ambiguous defense lawyer: In him, both the good and bad elements of human nature blend and flow like the entire series should/could have.

Hugh Grant pours on the scheming fiend in his Very English Scandal series

 Adrian Scarborough steals the show as George Carman QC

Our greatest underrated villain list headlines Paul Freeman from Raiders of the Lost Ark as Sir Joseph Cantley

Ben Whitshaw, as the pretty boy version of the beak-nosed real life Scott, suffers through bouts of meantime