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Grantchester

I’ve written before that Grantchester is the anti-Sherlock. It’s not nearly as fussed about clever games or tightly plotted mysteries as it is with getting down to the nitty gritty of the human soul. Last night’s episode punched this home — hard. Sure, the episode hung around a weak tea murder mystery that dug into spousal abuse and police brutality, but the only stuff worth talking about is what happened in the last ten minutes.

They really did it. They hung Gary Bell.

On other shows, we would see our clever hero find a way to save this young boy’s life. The weeks of emotional debate would have paid off with victory and Gary’s salvation would mark the community’s transcendence. Instead of being hung up on an “eye for an eye,” they would have learned the grace of reconciliation. But that’s not what happened at all.

In this way, Grantchester pulled a sick trick on us all. The episode opens with a hopeful Sidney (James Norton) meeting up with a very pregnant Amanda (Morven Christie). She’s taken Gary’s plight on as a pet cause — you know, the way bored and miserable rich housewives do. Still, her efforts seem mighty. Hope is the pointed theme of this scene: Hope for Gary, hope for Sidney, and hope for Amanda. She even brightly tells Sidney, “Without hope, where would we be?” Oof.

Immediately thereafter we see Sidney visiting Gary in jail. He’s brought with him cartons upon cartons of cigarettes. The implications are endless. Will the two world-weary men light up some smokes? Does Gary need them to trade for other goods? What’s that? Gary only wants the cigarettes for their collectable football cards.

The symbolism is clear: Gary isn’t a villain. He’s a child.

It makes his cruel, sharp death all the more horrifying. Kudos to Grantchester for taking us all the way there — and for letting James Norton eloquently show us how quickly one man can lose faith in the face of such a misery.

In his Fear The Walking Dead recap this week, Sean T. Collins wrote that the difference between that show and another nihilistic adventure, Game of Thrones, is “simple: Game of Thrones clearly can’t fucking stand its dog-eat-dog world, and is full of characters fighting and sacrificing to improve it.” Grantchester is fighting in those same trenches, but strangely takes this revulsion a step forward. Grantchester can’t stand that most of us are totally fine and dandy living with these horrifying inequities.

And this is where we see Sidney finally snap. Since the beginning of the series, Sidney has fought to reconcile the black-and-white morality of his faith and the coldly cut letter of the law with his own personal — and deeply progressive — ethics system. He’s always been the one preaching compassion for sinners, Germans, Jews, blacks, fallen women, jazz singers, Buddhists, homosexuals, and teenaged boys who accidentally kill their best friends in botched abortions. Where has it gotten him? Nowhere. No matter how he appeals to the community around them, they seem to prefer to separate life into sharp, harshly resolute boxes. No wonder he screams at Amanda, “What’s the point?”

In the same episode where Geordie (Robson Green) commits an act of police brutality, is almost framed for killing an inmate, and admits to cheating on his wife with Sidney’s ex, he gets to proudly tell Sidney that Gary Bell deserved to hang. (It’s fascinating to contrast this with the scene where Geordie watches his own friend — and former flame? — Rita say goodbye to her son after admitting to murdering her abusive husband. The implication is she, too, will hang and after everything he would have done for her, Geordie is okay with it.)

So, here it is: Sidney vs. Geordie. A rumble of love against law in the church.

Sidney and Geordie’s friendship forms the backbone of the show and represents a metaphoric marriage of law and order in the community. Their fight isn’t just that of two peeved brothers lashing out at one another; It’s a rumble of philosophies that can’t co-exist in our society. In the end, both are losers.

Is that it? Is there no hope left in the world? Grantchester also teases two potential life-affirming romances. Mrs. Maguire finally entertains the advances of Jack Chapman and Leonard starts to admit his own feelings for Daniel Marlowe. This, of course, only happens after Leonard has to confront his own unease with his homosexuality when Marlowe tries to kiss him.