Carnival Row: Series Review

Carnival Row is a series that I’ve been anticipating for months, ever since I saw the trailer for it on a Youtube video. After all, this is the first time we see Orlando Bloom and Cara Delevingne in major television roles, and the set and costume design for the show looked extraordinary. Yet one thing the trailers can’t include is the story and all of the dialogue, which ends up being the show’s biggest problem.

It’s very clear the show started off as a very high concept idea, with lore that was very well thought out, and very, very deep. This deepness is partially to the show’s benefit, and as someone who’s spent countless hours discussing the lore of the “Fallout” game series to no end, I’m partially intrigued by a show that has such heavy lore. But, to have such heavy lore in only eight hours of content that is also filled with many intricate subplots, there are going to be some important details that are brought up once and pass over the head of the average audience member. I remember countless times having to rewind and rewatch different scenes just so that I would catch everything. There were many brief lines delivered by characters that were important bits of information that were necessary to understanding the series as a whole. For some this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, and if you enjoy rewatching different scenes to get tidbits of information you didn’t realize before, this is a series for you.

But, to be clear, it’s also evident that these lines weren’t written intentionally for the rewatcher, they were mistakes due to the show’s bad writing. The show is chock full of laughably poorly written moments. One of the most memorable being when one of the characters rises from bed, says to the woman next to him, “gotta piss”, before walking out onto a balcony. It’s not mentioned or alluded to beforehand that there is a bathroom on the balcony, that the balcony typically serves that purpose, or that the character would be at all likely to pee off of the balcony,  making it a moment that made me laugh out loud when I first saw it, and still makes me chuckle writing it, as this was not the show’s intention.

The show’s two main characters weren’t exactly well written either. There’s Philo, the Batman-esque good guy with darkness and anger within him type and Vignette, the Ramona Flowers-esque tough, sarcastic, but soft at heart type. Together, they make up a story arc with little originality.

As far as the performances of the two lead actors, Orlando Bloom does a fine job of accomplishing his role as Philo, but, as expected from the “Pirates of the Caribbean” actor, it’s nothing Oscar winning. Cara Delevingne, on the other hand, performs her role quite well, and you can really see her emotions

On the other hand, all of the show’s subplots have a lot more to offer, all of them being much more interesting than the show’s main plot, containing characters with questionable morality and emotional complexity that the main plot does not have. While the writing is still fairly poor, it offers a lot more the main plot does. So, if you can get past the writing and main plot, this show may intrigue you for them.

Despite all of the show’s flaws, the set and costume design, makeup, lighting, and the music for the show all remain to be excellent. It’s one of the most aesthetically beautiful shows I’ve seen in a long time. It has elements of fantasy, elements of Victorian England, and elements of neo-noir that blend perfectly into a series I could spend hours just looking at different sets and costumes. It was so eerily beautiful it made me wish it was a real place I could visit.