The Frankenstein Chronicles review

[crossing-sweeper]

I went to see Uncle Vanya at the theatre here the other night. Vanessa Kirby (Lady Hervey) was in it as the beautiful Yelena. She is unbelievably THIN. She was good in the play but the most thrilling female perfomance of the night was by Jessica Brown Findlay, who played the doomed Lady Sybil in Downton Abbey. Here she is playing a plain spinster torn apart by unrequited love. She was totally, heart-stoppingly BRILLIANT .. !

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The Frankenstein Chronicles DVD Review

Aside from finding that most re-tellings of the tale (perhaps unsurprisingly) add their own take to the story… I found the main character Frankenstein’s monster quite a sad one. So when the chance to review The Frankenstein Chronicles came up I jumped at the chance.

So with that background and history as a launching point… I am really looking forward to where this series will go and thankfully series 2 has been picked up… now I have to wait! :(

http://www.impulsegamer.com/the-frankenstein-chronicles-dvd-review/

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‘The Frankenstein Chronicles’ Review: Sean Bean’s Netflix Series Comes Roaring to Life After Three Years in Purgatory
Brought back from the dead and well-stitched together, "The Frankenstein Chronicles" is a solid, strong-boned detective story.

Much like the mysterious characters’ laborious attempts to create living beings from dead flesh, “The Frankenstein Chronicles” had a long journey to American audiences. Acquired by A&E in 2015 to bolster its fledgling scripted originals programming, the Sean Bean-starring period drama never made it to the Arts & Entertainment network. Despite success with “Bates Motel,” the cable network couldn’t break through the peak TV pack with anything other than reality television (long live “Storage Wars”), so it scrapped the written word and moved on from such “Chronicles.”

But “Frankenstein” refused to die. The first season was met with strong reviews in the United Kingdom, airing on ITV’s Encore station, and was renewed for a second six-episode run. That much content cannot be ignored in today’s buyer’s market, especially with Bean’s internationally known mug leading both seasons. In swooped the streaming giant, and another Netflix “original” was born.

So was it worth the wait? Largely, yes. “The Frankenstein Chronicles” is far from an epic, addictive spectacle to rival the best dramas on modern television, but, as it stands, it’s the best new drama Netflix has offered in 2018 — miles ahead of past period dreck like “Marco Polo” (not to mention the company’s low-point, a.k.a. “Gypsy”) and offers more solidly built science-fiction than what’s seen in “Altered Carbon” and “The OA.” Plus, the end of Season 1 is perhaps the most Sean Bean-y scene Sean Bean has ever Sean been in.

Thanks in no small part to nuanced turns from Bean and “The Crown” star Vanessa Kirby(!), “The Frankenstein Chronicles” feels authentic even when it’s dropping names like Mary Shelley and alluding to characters like Dracula. The end of Season 1 is just terrific, both setting up the second season to a plethora of possibilities and concluding Marlott’s arc in clever fashion) not to mention the meta Sean Bean-ness of it all). While it’s unlikely to be remembered for as long as it took to make, “Frankenstein” certainly earned its shot at a long life on Netflix.

“The Frankenstein Chronicles” Seasons 1 and 2 are streaming now on Netflix.

http://www.indiewire.com/2018/02/frankenstein-chronicles-review-netflix-season-1-season-2-1201931568/

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The Frankenstein Chronicles: It’s Alive! Or is it?

Originally released for British television, The Frankenstein Chronicles (a two-season series), has dropped into Netflix’s new queue for U.S. binge watcher consumption

Part tale of the macabre, part police procedural, part historical drama, this show has a little bit that might appeal to many — though with no fast-paced action, gun fights or chase scenes, it certainly isn’t for everyone.

Mirroring the pages of long-dead poets and the poisoned pen of the late Mary Shelley, The Frankenstein Chronicles takes the long road to reach its climax. Though not just another regurgitation of the classic horror novel, it definitely takes the pacing of the original Frankenstein film to heart.

Like many of the classic horror stories of that era, it starts on a dark and stormy night, a corpse and a man with a haunted past (played by Sean Bean of Game of Thrones).

Set in 19th century London, Bean plays police officer John Marlott.
Stumbling upon the morbid remains of eight children all patched together as a single corpse, Marlott heads down a rabbit hole of capital crime and church conspiracy.  All the while, a turbulent clash between religion and science takes place among parliament.

Marlott’s journey into the seedy underbelly of London leads to questioning the likes of famous poet William Blake and the infamous writer herself, Mary Shelley (played by Anna Maxwell Martin of Bleak House). Shelley harbors a heavy heart and dark secrets, as a copycat killer terrorizes the city.

Netflix’s new thumbs up/thumbs down rating system fails me yet again, with The Frankenstein Chronicles being neither a triumph nor a total fail. On my own one=out-of-five scale though, I’d give the first season a solid 3.5-out-of-5 and the second and final season a shaky 4-out-of-5.

Chock full of mad science, twisted tales of sin and corruption, plenty of gore and a powerful cabal set on world domination, The Frankenstein Chronicles might just suit your fancy come a cloudy day with a nice cup of tea and a biscuit.

The Frankenstein Chronicles is now available to stream on Netflix, with two six-episode seasons.

https://showsnob.com/2018/02/28/the-frankenstein-chronicles-netflix-review/

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The Great Bingeable Gothic Mystery on Netflix

Every English major knows that in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, actually, it’s the doctor who’s named Frankenstein. In Netflix’s new horror mystery show The Frankenstein Chronicles, actually it’s… no one is named Frankenstein. The Frankenstein Chronicles, joins the recent spate of TV horror shows that have reimagined classic horror works, but instead of being a prequel like Bates Motel or a reboot like Hannibal, The Frankenstein Chronicles stitches together a completely new creature from parts of Shelley’s classic novel (see what I did there?).

The Frankenstein Chronicles stars Sean Bean (Ned Stark from Game of Thrones) as John Marlott, a “river detective” in 19th century London who finds the mutilated corpse of a young girl in the water. Except it isn’t one girl, it’s a corpse composed of body parts from eight different children sewn together. The disturbing surgery catches the eye of the Home Secretary Sir Robert Peel (Tom Ward), who fears the corpse was made to discredit the controversial “Anatomy Act” he is promoting in parliament. The act would both professionalize the medical practice and would allow the surgery schools to use and dissect the corpses of the poor. Marlott is tasked with investigating the murders and, presumably, clear the surgeons of any wrongdoing. Soon Marlott and his new partner Joseph Nightingale (Richie Campbell) are getting sucked into the dark underworld of kid snatchers, murder gangs, and corpse selling.

When Marlott is not crawling through the murky underbelly of London, he is mingling with elements of high society including aristocrats opposed to the Anatomy Act and Mary Shelley (Anna Maxwell Martin) herself, an introduction that is a bit awkward but later becomes pivotal to the plot. Marlott also has problems of his own, including a tragic past and a bad case of Syphilis whose mercury medicine gives him eerie hallucinations. The show is filmed in gloomy Gothic fashion, and the period costumes and set designs are well executed. Sean Bean is in excellent Sean Bean form as detective Marlott, playing the character as half-haggard half-heroic. The surrounding cast is strong too, especially Vanessa Kirby (Princess Margaret on The Crown) as a impoverished noblewoman.

The Frankenstein Chronicles is one of those “Netflix Originals” that originated elsewhere. The first six-episode season aired in 2015 on Britain’s ITV Encore and was originally going to be brought to to the US by A&E, who acquired the show and then seemingly gave up on its prestige drama aspirations. It’s a nice pick-up for Netflix though. While The Frankenstein Chronicles is hardly groundbreaking television, it’s a well made and perfectly bingeable TV show that mixes Gothic mystery with historical drama and just enough scares to keep you up at night.
 

https://www.gq.com/story/the-great-bingeable-gothic-mystery-on-netflix?mbid=social_twitter