1x05 Book V: Gospel

This episode still showcases a lot of the issues underlying Flanagan as a creative, but comes together more effectively than I anticipated. At the very least, we're finally diving into the horror elements of the show that were promised to us. I'm intrigued by the idea of exploring vampirism as a critique of organized religion, but I also can't say that the long path we've taken to getting there (taking until the halfway point of the season) isn't underwhelming. As viewers, we're very accustomed to this idea of the slow burn to the point where in the modern age anything that teases out plot details is now branded as one. But this is a misnomer and inaccurate. The best slow burns don't usually withhold plot details so much as let those events unfold as a pace that allows them to delve deep into their subject matter and reflect on the psyche in the process. If you watch Mindhunter, you'd be incorrect if you thought the plot points were withheld because stuff is continually happening--it just doesn't have the fast pace. Midnight Mass and, by extension, Flanagan's work as a whole does withhold those plot points to the point where large sections of episodes can completely disregard any sort of horror tone and theming. It becomes boring not necessarily because it isn't well-acted or well-written (although the writing is a little shoddy), but because I feel like we end up watching two shows with completely different goals suddenly collide.

Flanagan always has a big ask and a big gamble: he wants you to care about these characters without really having an entry point to learn about them. It'd be like if we met the residents of Twin Peaks without Laura Palmer's death or if we met the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815 before they got onto the plane. The strength of the characters of Twin Peaks and LOST is that because we understand the context of the predicament they're in, learning their backstories informs the audience why they do the things they do. Particularly on the island (because LOST does rely so heavily on flashbacks) this is important because the things the survivors struggle with is ongoing. There's a sense that those flashbacks thematically line up with the conflict of those episodes. In Midnight Mass this is skewed because the linearity of the show doesn't allow for thematic storytelling based on perceived character struggle. I bring this up for this episode's review because here Flanagan actually does what LOST does. Riley's struggle is told non-linearly so as to highlight the character conflict from a thematic standpoint rather than just showing us that conflict in a straightforward manner. It works decently well here, even if that structure now sticks out in comparison to prior episodes. And really, it's only a minor reshuffling that likely could have been done for prior episodes too.

There's still an excruciating amount monologuing when characters could say things concisely to keep the ball rolling, but this time the content of the episode bolsters that--likely due to the fact that what these characters are talking about are actually theme related. Could it still be shorter? Yes. Should it be shorter? Absolutely. But at least one of these monologues is a sermon which, in my experience, sometimes feel like they drag on longer than you wish they would. It's an odd thing. Because as someone who's written screenplays before (not necessarily successfully, I should say), I can tell you that monologues are something that you're usually kind of avoiding. They're extremely difficult to write, so it usually feels like it's best to keep them shorter for the most part if you're not just going to avoid them entirely. Very few writers are able to effectively make those monologues work and it takes projects like Network or There Will Be Blood that are also bolstered by top tier directing and some of the best acting you've ever seen to really sell them. So it's not like any of these individual elements in this episode are bad, it's just that it doesn't feel like Midnight Mass knows how to play to its strengths. At least Riley's story wasn't told in a long-take a la Hill House.

We're deep into this show now. More or less we know the types of plot points that are coming at us for the final two episodes. I don't really know specifics, but it feels like our protagonists (heroes?) are more or less teed up to get stuff done. I desperately wish Midnight Mass would have delved into the twisted misunderstanding that is mistaking a vampire for an angel a bit more so as to conflate organized religion with a parasitic leech that twists moral lessons meant for the greater good. So far that's been extremely subtle sub-text.

I thought the ending of this episode was nicely executed, even if still a touch overly dramatic. It seems like there were some decisions made in post to keep the horror at the forefront there, rather than keep is solely in melodrama. This episode came the closest so far to being something I could say I like since the first episode, but I just can't quite get on board here. Good performances are being undercut by extremely basic filmmaking that does little to push its ideas effectively. But hey, at least it's better than Bly Manor.