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Call the Midwife 5.08
Season finale, and time for hankerchiefs.
The show teased the possible death of Sister Monica Joan so often that I never got worried about Sister Evangelina, not even after last week's revelation she'd had a stroke. And yet it's fitting that she dies without long preparation (either on a Doylist or Watsonian level), in the night, in her sleep, after helping one last mother and child and happy in her craft (and having grumbled one more time at Sister Monica Joan). I didn't guess until Fred showed up, and since then I haven't stopped sniffling. She was such a character.
(Sidenote: they really couldn't get Miranda Hart back, even for a cameo appearance, could they? Because clearly Peter's dialogue with Trixie was originally written for Chummy.)
The cases of the week were minor and happy, optimistic ones, since they took a backseat to the season long arc (well, sort of arc) that comes to a close as Distaval/Thalidomide/Contergan (all three names were used in this episode) is outed and our heroines and hero (poor Dr. Turner!) come to a horrible conclusion, and the mothers from the two relevant episodes are back in this one, Rhoda with baby Susan showing that while she and her family love Susan, the strain of living with a handicapped child is still present and sometimes hard to bear, while Ruby is practically destroyed by the loss of her baby daughter (and she doesn't even know the worst, the left-to-die part). I thought it brought over the incredible damage the medication - and the greed of the pharma industry - did on a visceral, personal level, as it should, and much more effectively than if the show had tried to deal with the issue in only one episode. Characteristically for this show, too, is that while everyone is horrified and angsting about their own part in contributing the medication, they also immediately snap into action in order to protect other patients from suffering the same damage.
Not coming to a close but taking another step forward: Patsy, Delia and Delia's mother, as Patsy point blank announces hers and Delia's intention of travelling together and asks for Delia's birth certificate so she can get a pass port. (Yours truly, being a 1969 born European, had always taken it granted everyone has a pass port from childhood onwards until visiting the US for the first time, where a lot of people I met hadn't, since they never left the country and thus never needed it.) I thought the reaction of Delia's mother, signaling she knew/had figured out Patsy and Delia were an item and while not happy was accepting it, was a plausible one given what we've seen of her; not the supportive parent of one's dreams, but not a raging "zomg unnatural" style homophobe, either. It was a low key coming out scene in an episode that had its big drama elsewhere, and a further milestone for Patsy and Delia, whose announcement that she'll train as a midwife (in addition to being a nurse) presumably means she'll become a regular next year. Yay!
In conclusion: a very moving finale in what was a season with tragedies but also much solidarity and friendship, as is this show's want, and why I love it.
The show teased the possible death of Sister Monica Joan so often that I never got worried about Sister Evangelina, not even after last week's revelation she'd had a stroke. And yet it's fitting that she dies without long preparation (either on a Doylist or Watsonian level), in the night, in her sleep, after helping one last mother and child and happy in her craft (and having grumbled one more time at Sister Monica Joan). I didn't guess until Fred showed up, and since then I haven't stopped sniffling. She was such a character.
(Sidenote: they really couldn't get Miranda Hart back, even for a cameo appearance, could they? Because clearly Peter's dialogue with Trixie was originally written for Chummy.)
The cases of the week were minor and happy, optimistic ones, since they took a backseat to the season long arc (well, sort of arc) that comes to a close as Distaval/Thalidomide/Contergan (all three names were used in this episode) is outed and our heroines and hero (poor Dr. Turner!) come to a horrible conclusion, and the mothers from the two relevant episodes are back in this one, Rhoda with baby Susan showing that while she and her family love Susan, the strain of living with a handicapped child is still present and sometimes hard to bear, while Ruby is practically destroyed by the loss of her baby daughter (and she doesn't even know the worst, the left-to-die part). I thought it brought over the incredible damage the medication - and the greed of the pharma industry - did on a visceral, personal level, as it should, and much more effectively than if the show had tried to deal with the issue in only one episode. Characteristically for this show, too, is that while everyone is horrified and angsting about their own part in contributing the medication, they also immediately snap into action in order to protect other patients from suffering the same damage.
Not coming to a close but taking another step forward: Patsy, Delia and Delia's mother, as Patsy point blank announces hers and Delia's intention of travelling together and asks for Delia's birth certificate so she can get a pass port. (Yours truly, being a 1969 born European, had always taken it granted everyone has a pass port from childhood onwards until visiting the US for the first time, where a lot of people I met hadn't, since they never left the country and thus never needed it.) I thought the reaction of Delia's mother, signaling she knew/had figured out Patsy and Delia were an item and while not happy was accepting it, was a plausible one given what we've seen of her; not the supportive parent of one's dreams, but not a raging "zomg unnatural" style homophobe, either. It was a low key coming out scene in an episode that had its big drama elsewhere, and a further milestone for Patsy and Delia, whose announcement that she'll train as a midwife (in addition to being a nurse) presumably means she'll become a regular next year. Yay!
In conclusion: a very moving finale in what was a season with tragedies but also much solidarity and friendship, as is this show's want, and why I love it.
Re: Passports
Re: Passports