Ratched: What the Must Watch reviewers think
Every week, the Must Watch podcasters review the biggest TV and streaming shows.
This week, Hayley Campbell and Scott Bryan share their thoughts on Ratched on Netflix.
Inspired by the iconic character in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, Ryan Murphy's drama tells the origin story of asylum nurse Mildred Ratched. In 1947, Mildred (Sarah Paulson) arrives in Northern California to seek employment at a leading psychiatric hospital where new experiments have begun on the human mind. Sharon Stone and Cynthia Nixon also star.
Have you been watching it? What did you think? Leave your comments below...
Listen to the latest episode of the Must Watch podcast on BBC Sounds.
Subscribe here, and never miss an episode.
(Credit: Netflix)
Scott says: "You can get sucked into thinking it's good"
"I had a fun time but not in the sort of way I’d expect with this sort of work. Normally it is quite well story lined, it has that level of depth to it and be expressively dark, this felt like it was taking ‘American Horror Story’ and trying to make a Netflix variation of it without infringing on the copyright of his previous work. It is not necessarily a bad thing, but there's a pattern in which his Netflix projects aren't always working. His other show ‘Hollywood’ was utterly absurd. It didn’t reflect history at all, even though it was trying to highlight people in our history that should have had more of a spotlight on them.
"You can get sucked into just enjoying the ride and thinking it is good. The problem about this though is that, I think they’ve cared so much on how it looks, you won’t see better costume, lighting, set design on any other show this year.
"The ridiculousness you’d expect with Ryan Murphy was kind of lacking. Sarah Paulson is one of the greatest actors on TV, and it felt like she had nothing to do and really trying hard to be this character. Ratched is one of the most difficult characters in TV and film to play; you’re essentially a psychological torturer trying to do it behind an everyday pleasant face of bureaucracy. You don’t know you are so bad and evil when you’re just sentencing people through the day. Paulson nailed it in the characterisation. Shame about the plot."
(Credit: Netflix)
Hayley says: "Like watching a moving Pintrest board"
"I am rather split when it comes to Ryan Murphy: some stuff I love and some stuff I loathe. So I was wondering where this was going to fall in the scheme of Ryan Murphy stuff. Would it be in the same area as the objectively good shows like The People Vs. OJ Simpson or The Assassination of Gianni Versace or would it be laughably horrible like Hollywood?
"I thought this one was very stylised, the costumes and the make-up were all extravagantly done, and the whole thing is so constant in its aesthetic details that it was almost like I was watching a moving Pintrest board. It was gorgeous to watch and shot-wise it felt like someone had seen The Shining before they went to the set that day.
"Of all the Ryan Murphy things we have watched, this is maybe the most ridiculous, but it is very knowing in its ridiculousness. There’s a scene in the second episode where a lobotomy is being carried out to rid the patient of her lesbianism. Throughout this, the camera lingers on the faces of two famous lesbians in Cynthia Nixon and Sarah Paulson, one horrified, one barely able to stay in her seat with excitement. Every chance they get in ‘Ratched’ to be absurd, unrealistic or theatrical they will take it. Even in the surgery demonstration on medical cadavers, the cadaver is a beautiful model with her breasts out. It’s completely non-essential, but nothing in a Ryan Murphy show like this is essential. In Ryan Murphy land, Catholic priests are young and hot and so are medical cadavers and it's fine.
"It's not good like OJ, but it's not bad like Hollywood. If you go in fully aware that it's very silly, I think you'll have a fun time."
(Credit: Netflix)
Ratched is available now on Netflix.
Must Watch is released as a podcast every Monday evening from BBC Sounds, or through your podcast app.
This week, as Disney's kids content moves from Sky and Virgin to Disney + the team speak to the Senior Vice President at the streaming service, Luke Bradley-Jones. They also review Life on BBC One and Honour on ITV.
