Wednesday, April 24, 2013

The Syndicate UK -or- Neville Hits Wormtail with a Whiskey Bottle


Okay, so I’ve only watched the first episode, but I need to tell you about The Syndicate. First of all, it sounds like a mobster show, which it’s not. It’s a program about a group of down and out grocery shop employees who win the lottery. Now, with that description it sounds like a bit of a light-hearted jaunt. It’s not that either. It’s a drama revolving around the problems these five people have and how money can’t fix them.

                                                            Pictured: These five people. 

First there’s Stuart, who’s nominally our main character (though I understand that each episode focuses on a different character to explore them more in-depth). Stuart’s a boy with a good heart. He’s got a girlfriend called Amy, a son, and, by the end of the episode, a daughter. Stuart has been working his job at the Right Buy U (which I get the impression is a bit of a grocer meets 7-11) since he was fifteen and loves it. Amy doesn’t get along with Stuart’s mom, who is constantly belittling her in front of her son. Amy leaves Stuart, telling him that he needs to find a better job and a place for them to live if he wants them to be together. Reasonable enough, right? Unfortunately, the reason that Stuart has to live with his mom in the first place and has terrible credit is that Amy is a bit of a spender. Oh, and the Right Buy U is closing and they’re all getting laid off.

Stuart’s brother, Jamie (played by Neville Longbottom), appears to be pretty happy just watching whatever the British equivalent of Maury is and bumming around. He’s sensible enough, and charming, but has a bit of a sketchy past. In this universe, Neville used to be a bit of a drug addict. He wants to help his brother (and himself) by robbing the Right Buy U. In theory, he’ll pose as a robber, Stuart will open the safe and give him all the money, then Jamie will have some pocket money and Stuart will have the down-payment for a flat with Amy. Easy peasy.

                                                  Gran? Who taught you to use a phone?

Then we’ve got Leanne. On the surface, she’s a pretty basic single mother. She wishes she had more money so she could do nice things for her daughter, like take her to Disneyland. She works hard to support herself and her daughter and is the first to fill out an application for the store that’s being built over the Right Buy U. Leanne, however, has a dark past of sorts. Leanne isn’t her real name. She used to live in Wales before moving to Leeds. Her daughter’s father is still there, as far as she knows, and she seems concerned about him finding out where they are. Which will be tricky if she’s in all the papers for winning the lottery.

Denise, another of the employees at Right Buy U, is a middle-aged, portly woman with dubious teeth. She dresses atrociously and you can almost smell her through the screen. She also has a heart of gold. She’s got a couple of dogs that she loves very much and a husband she’s very devoted to. Denise worries a lot about her appearance, remarking on how she wishes she weren’t so ugly. Her husband ignores her and it’s implied that he’s cheating on her; he racks up a huge phone bill texting the same number that he’s very defensive about. Denise is the one that runs the lottery syndicate and picked the winning numbers. But can money buy love?

Last, we come to Bob. Bob is the kindly old store manager (played by Peter Pettigrew). He is very sympathetic to Stuart’s plight and honestly wishes he could help, but instead has to break the news that the shop is closing down. He and Denise were offered positions at another Right Buy U branch, but the other employees were not. Bob’s got two sons that never speak to him and refuse to help him in any way. And he needs help, as he’s been very dizzy lately and vomiting regularly, indicating some health issue we haven’t seen yet. Unfortunately, he has got a health issue we have seen, as Jamie puts him in a coma during the botched fake robbery.

Each of these characters has a problem that, on the surface, is easily solved by money. Needing a place to live, wanting not to work, desiring a better life for one’s child, wanting to be more conventionally attractive, not wanting to lose their job. But it’s all so much more complicated than that.

                             Loves a gold-digger, hiding from an ex, hates herself, wants drugs.

I am confident recommending The Syndicate, even though I've only seen the one episode so far. It's gripping. I cried. I was on the edge of my seat.

It's not at all what I expected from a show about some minimum wage shop workers who strike it rich. And that's a good thing. 

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