Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I loved the first three seasons of Bramwell -- they did a good job of capturing the complications of being a female doctor in the late Victorian period. The characters have depth and the narrative is well-constructed; at the end of a 45 or so minute episode, I felt like I'd watched a much longer show (in a good way). Then, enter Season 4. I was so excited by the ending of Season 3.... but I should have stopped there and let the characters live on in my mind. Season 4 destroys them: Eleanor completely loses her grounding, and while her hesitancy at marriage is understandable, her actions reinforce the very social mores that the first three seasons so carefully undercut -- she epitomizes all of the patriarchy's reasons for why women could not be independent, let alone professionals. Plus, considering her history (with Dr. O'Neill particularly), her actions are simply unbelievable. John Marsham, always a complicated character too, loses his respect of Eleanor's individuality and comes across as boorish. Again, while contemplating Eleanor as "wife" rather than just as "colleague" could believably change his behavior, his character takes a bizarre, controlling turn. Even Nurse Carr, though the most consistent character throughout the series, is developed unbelievably: Based on the morals and ideas she espouses throughout the series, it seems unlikely that she would embrace a particularly controversial situation (for the time) that Eleanor found herself in. There are also unexplained and very noticeably missing cast members, whose support was desperately needed in these episodes to establish continuity, and these absences (and their odd and unmemorable replacements) are never explained. The contradictory nature of these two episodes, as compared to the first three seasons, is glaringly revealed in the child prostitution storyline. Eleanor stupidly (really, a doctor working in that neighborhood would have recognized what was happening, not to mention that considering the timeline, W.T. Stead's "expose" on child prostitution would have been part of social consciousness) sends Dora along with a brothel-keeper, justifying it to herself because of her discovery about Marsham. Then, when the girl cannot be found, "child prostitution" becomes her crusade, and she subjects everyone to her high and mighty, self-righteous rhetoric about how no one is doing enough -- Instead of being a representative for women who did smartly campaign for reform, her character presents as irrational and even hypocritical. All of the faults in the storyline and characterization are exacerbated by the filming changes. It's as if someone decided to make a postmodern rendition of a Victorian story, with a nonlinear storyline with, at times, bizarre scenes. The shots are often close-ups or the scene is shot from the ground, and the quality of the shot is rarely consistent -- at times, it felt like I was watching a fuzzy screen. The set of the Thrift had also changed in inexplicable ways. All of this was disconcerting in a season that was already transitional (considering the exit of Mr. Bramwell in the season 3 finale and the selling of her family home) -- it felt as if I were watching an entirely new (and entirely disappointing) show. If you love the first three seasons, stop with them. The last is a travesty, reinforcing all of the reasons why society believed women needed to be parented/guarded till marriage and revealing Eleanor to have the same "hysteria" and lack of self-reflection that she despised in her "bored" female patients in earlier episodes. I'm so sorry I watched it.