last night andy & i watched the final episode in the new zealand tv series outrageous fortune; we’ve been watching the boxed dvd set over the last year and a half or so – six series, each with about 18 45-minute episodes – so it’s been a big part of our lives for a while. we’ve followed the trials & tribulations of the west family down to every sordid detail. as someone who has never been a big tv-watcher, & even less of a regular series follower, i have to say this one had me hooked. i’d seen the occasional episode when it was originally screened on tv in new zealand, but my nomadic lifestyle meant i didn’t even try to keep up with it – but i have devoured the dvds eagerly. mostly it’s been a very fine series – epic and shakespearian in every respect, and andy says it’s given her a special insight into the unique kiwi character (i haven’t broken it to her yet that not everyone in nz is like the wests … )

however, the ending has disappointed me – specifically the storyline of pascalle and judd; this was completely unconvincing. compare judd and cheryl’s sexy flirtations, even in their final meeting, with judd’s sheepish attitude around pascalle and her pathetic agonising. the director must have instructed them to express the conflict between their hearts and their minds, but this has resulted in pascalle looking like she’s suffering from severe indigestion & judd looking like he wishes he was somewhere else (with cheryl, probably). remember the way that he pursued cheryl in earlier episodes, and the things he gave up (such as his job, and for a while his freedom) to be with her – a strong, beautiful mature woman whom he clearly respected, admired and desired. pascalle, on the other hand, is an airhead; sweet, but slow and naive, demonstrating none of her mother’s strength of character. if anything, she’s looking for a father-figure; but this means she loses all her sexiness around judd. it would have made more sense if judd had got it on with loretta.

obviously it made good drama – the scandal of the daughter running off with her mother’s lover while her mother is in jail; but it didn’t satisfy me at the end of what has otherwise been a fairly consistently good series. there are other things i could criticise – such as the utterly irritating character of bailey the lawyer & some of the more stupid extraneous storylines like loretta’s irish dancing episode – but mostly it’s a pretty damn good series from our very small television production industry. anyway, now it’s over … a few people have recommended the american tv series madmen to me, so perhaps i’ll check that out …