The original post: /r/television by /u/JakeM917 on 2025-03-11 17:56:28.

If you’re like me, you may have been a bit perplexed when Steven Moffatt announced he was writing a show tackling cancel culture and its effects on a straight white news anchor. It seemed out of touch, completely alienating a whole audience who had been following him since Doctor Who. What was even more confusing to me was that, as it was airing in the UK, I saw praise from audiences that I didn’t think would be fans of this concept.

The first two episodes of this show are now on Britbox in the U.S., with the other two coming out this Thursday, so I thought I’d give it a shot to see what was up. And wow, that was not what I was expecting at all.

I honestly think this show, especially with that title, was meant to draw in a subset of the culture that might have thought “Hell yeah, finally someone is talking about this!” You know the people I’m referring to. But halfway through, this show flips the script on its head and you realize it’s a completely different show than you thought it was. I’m sure knowing this is enough for you to connect some dots and figure out what might happen, but it’s still worth a watch regardless. I decided to finish the show with the help of NordVPN, but everything should be available on Britbox in a couple days.

Karen Gillan is just absolutely masterful in this role — honestly everyone is, except for some occasionally cringy writing of Gen Z characters, but Gillan just knocks it out of the park. One of the interesting things to me as a Doctor Who fan was seeing another show with Karen Gillan and Alex Kingston, but I don’t think when they shared the screen I even processed that fact. Their characterization and the way it portrays certain situations were so carefully done.

I’ll say it probably won’t blow you out of the water. It’s a solid 8/10. But it’s certainly worth watching, and I wanted to raise awareness that the show isn’t going to do what you think it’s going to do with the subject matter. And even if you were expecting it to subvert your expectations, or if you see everything coming, it’s still so well done that I don’t think you’ll regret watching.

EDIT: I posted this in a comment below, but figured I’d put it here. People seem keen on wanting to know what happens rather than just giving the show a chance, so I will provide you with both options.

Spoiler Lite:

The joke that Douglas allegedly made was about Karen Gillan’s character. We find this out at the end of the second episode, with the third episode mostly exploring the incident he is supposedly making light of, and the rest of the show is about her character working to expose Douglas and his behavior.

Full Spoiler:

Karen Gillan’s character (Madeline) was obsessed with Douglas from a young age, and basically worked her whole life to be on TV like he was. However, in attempting to land the job, Douglas’ producer interviews her in his hotel room and attempts to coerce her into having sex with him to get the job. Douglas knocks on his hotel room door and Madeline answers, very obviously distressed. By this time we know that Douglas knows what’s going on in there, but he doesn’t try to help her. Three years later (the present day), Madeline hears about this tweet, and makes the (probably correct) assumption that the joke was about her. She’s heard rumors that when Douglas is asked when he knew Madeline would be a star, he replies “Probably when I saw her in our producer’s hotel room.” So she sets out to essentially trick him into ruining his own career by winding him up and talking him into inviting scrutiny over his actions on Twitter. Madeline doesn’t want the story out, she just wants him to admit to what he did in front of her and his family, which she gets. In the process, Douglas was filmed taking about how in the news they often manufacture stories or embellish the truth to make good television, which eventually leaks due to his tweet. Thus ruining his own career and freeing Madeline.