The Baby premieres April 24 on HBO and will be available to stream on HBO Max. New episodes weekly.
A great by-product of the current influx of new television is that we’re getting a lot of diverse, episodic horror storytelling so it’s not all just deadly serious dramas. Thankfully, black comedies are more common and a particularly promising one was the U.K. production of The Baby from co-creators Siân Robins-Grace (Sex Education) and Lucy Gaymer. An original, eight-episode limited series that’s billed as a “surreal comedy/horror” which in fact really doesn’t land any of those descriptors. Cheesily produced and lacking consistently sharp wit which is needed to sell a black comedy, The Baby doesn’t bring anything startling or particularly funny to the genre.
Set in contemporary London, Natasha (Michelle De Swarte) is a free-spirit chef nearing 40 without a partner or kids. In fact, she’s more than a little angry that all of her close girlfriends have babies, or are happily pregnant. Happy to berate her friends for their children ruining her sacred girls poker night, she ends up alienating her circle to such a degree that she decides to book an impromptu solo seaside getaway to sort out her head. It’s at this remote, ramshackle cabin that she witnesses a body dead drop from the cliffs above and an infant literally falls into her arms.
As far as premises go, that’s a pretty good one. But writer Robins-Grace and the incredibly talented director Nicole Kassell (Watchmen) approach the material with bewildering choices that continually lean into horror cliches without any ambition to reinvent them with clever cinematography or camera use. They don’t even choose the lane of going over the top with blood or gore. It’s all just rather sedate and unimaginative.
As Natasha finds herself burdened with this “heaven sent” baby, she remains entirely adverse to its proximity and even her discomfort with touching it feels forced and overly orchestrated for some tepid physical comedy moments. What’s more interesting are the scenarios that keep bringing the baby back into her orbit, but even those scenes aren’t particularly funny or even provocative. There’s a lot of time wasted on Natasha saying nothing of interest to colleagues and friends, or scenes where she's driving instead of scenes where they could have developed her beyond the one-note baby issues. Even the supporting cast isn’t given any memorable eccentricities. They’re just normal people, and the cops are awkward and that’s pretty much it.
Yes, it’s very clear there is an attempt to explore a metaphor here, about women who aren’t maternal and the stigma from those who are. And there’s certainly a glimmer of a fun idea about a demon baby being attracted like a magnet to a woman who doesn’t want it. But in the pilot, that promising idea is far more intriguing than what is actually presented.
Looking at the current competition, Servant and Shining Vale are just two recent examples of horror series that have figured out how to wisely use a 30-minute format, like The Baby’s, to their advantage. In the case of Servant, the series marries the grotesque with the mundane, while Shining Vale is funny first with well-placed jump scares to keep us on our toes. But there’s none of that crisp execution with The Baby. The comedy is barely there, the supporting characters are bland, and the scares are non-existent.
Just about the only surprising and intriguing aspect of the show is its score by Lucrecia Dalt (The Seed). Using strange sampling featuring raspy female voices and heavy breathing, she elevates the extremely cliched opening teaser with her disconcerting underscore. It’s unfortunate that the visuals don’t rise to the level of what she’s daring to try. And some kudos also go to however many babies they’ve cast to play the demon seeds. The kids are pretty cute and their guileless performances steal just about every scene they’re in, which doesn’t exactly help the show land a tone of terror. Maybe The Baby will find its groove in future episodes, but if you can’t hook audiences in the pilot with either laughs or scares, there’s not a lot of confidence that it will get it right somewhere down the line.
from IGN Reviews https://ift.tt/ZaSLvnB
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