There's good and bad to this show, and it seems there's good and bad to the anti-Christ too which is just a tad confusing. At least we might expect the anti-Christ were he to exist to be a bit of a deceiver, pretending to be an all round good egg, while in reality sucking boiled eggs like Louis Cypher in Angel Heart but in Damien we have someone who is actually trying pretty hard to be a good person rather than anything genuinely beastly.
That actually is the shows main strength: that someone who in the original 70s film seemed likely to be pretty irredeemable might actually become - as he encounters the competing forces of his identity - genuinely conflicted. Indeed this rendering of the Damien story makes it very clear that even if he literally IS the beast of revelation (yeah, let that sink in) he's at least fifty shades of grey as well.
Which brings us to his effect on people. Women fall for him. Well lets face it women would fall at the feet of any man who could claim to be the ultimate bad boy. Even the nun who turns up mid-series looks like she's sublimating lesbian leanings (well she's a TV nun isn't she?) towards the prince of darkness. Perhaps the ultimate bad guy can straighten a woman out and obviously the women around him think they can straighten him out too, well, maybe, turn him into marriage material or something, and for most of the series it looks pretty likely that they might succeed.But ladies, seriously, you can't change who we are, right. Comprendez.
Of course while there are some who want to save him from his self and from his apocalyptical destiny there are also some who want to help him fulfil it. Barbara Hershey is one of them, and actually she's a breath of fresh air, probably the best thing in the show. Amazingly this is a woman who's approaching 70 now, but could easily pass for her late 40s. Hershey is easily the strongest character in a series where the ensemble, although fit for purpose are slightly lacking in the necessary gravitas. It is she alone that really gives us the sense of who this guy might some day be, and she does a great job of juggling the facets of devotee and disciplining governess figure, taking over spiritually from that nasty protective governess nanny who appeared in the original film.
As for the actor / character Damien himself, he's not entirely satisfactory, although he does OK. On balance I'd say he does a far better job at playing the nice guy than the Leviathan evolving before our eyes. There's still time for him to grow into the character of course, not least because this is someone or some thing that is itself evolving, and spreading its luciferian wings. I am not entirely sure I will join this show for the next series but I am quite curious to discover where Damien will be taken as his inner daemon comes to the fore. Again, the inner tensions of this character who has to face the almost ultimate horror of self-discovery, is an interesting one, but this romantic tortured fallen angel (so beloved of teenage chick fiction) really has to go further than that if it is to present us with something truly, if you will, ungodly. The anti- Christ is supposed to be deceiver, someone who might be capable of brute force and violence on an unimaginable scale, but ultimately there should be something morally fatal about his character - and seductively so as well - not just some external brand such as the mark of the beast. We spend the first series in the company of someone who makes it very clear he doesn't want what fate has given him, and as such he comes across in this sense as someone discovering something alien about himself (for a good comparison consider Mickey Rourke's character in the aforementioned Angel Heart). But should the anti-Christ really come across as fairly innocent. The latter part of the series begins to address this perhaps. But still where is the pride which precedes the fall?
That actually is the shows main strength: that someone who in the original 70s film seemed likely to be pretty irredeemable might actually become - as he encounters the competing forces of his identity - genuinely conflicted. Indeed this rendering of the Damien story makes it very clear that even if he literally IS the beast of revelation (yeah, let that sink in) he's at least fifty shades of grey as well.
Which brings us to his effect on people. Women fall for him. Well lets face it women would fall at the feet of any man who could claim to be the ultimate bad boy. Even the nun who turns up mid-series looks like she's sublimating lesbian leanings (well she's a TV nun isn't she?) towards the prince of darkness. Perhaps the ultimate bad guy can straighten a woman out and obviously the women around him think they can straighten him out too, well, maybe, turn him into marriage material or something, and for most of the series it looks pretty likely that they might succeed.But ladies, seriously, you can't change who we are, right. Comprendez.
Of course while there are some who want to save him from his self and from his apocalyptical destiny there are also some who want to help him fulfil it. Barbara Hershey is one of them, and actually she's a breath of fresh air, probably the best thing in the show. Amazingly this is a woman who's approaching 70 now, but could easily pass for her late 40s. Hershey is easily the strongest character in a series where the ensemble, although fit for purpose are slightly lacking in the necessary gravitas. It is she alone that really gives us the sense of who this guy might some day be, and she does a great job of juggling the facets of devotee and disciplining governess figure, taking over spiritually from that nasty protective governess nanny who appeared in the original film.
As for the actor / character Damien himself, he's not entirely satisfactory, although he does OK. On balance I'd say he does a far better job at playing the nice guy than the Leviathan evolving before our eyes. There's still time for him to grow into the character of course, not least because this is someone or some thing that is itself evolving, and spreading its luciferian wings. I am not entirely sure I will join this show for the next series but I am quite curious to discover where Damien will be taken as his inner daemon comes to the fore. Again, the inner tensions of this character who has to face the almost ultimate horror of self-discovery, is an interesting one, but this romantic tortured fallen angel (so beloved of teenage chick fiction) really has to go further than that if it is to present us with something truly, if you will, ungodly. The anti- Christ is supposed to be deceiver, someone who might be capable of brute force and violence on an unimaginable scale, but ultimately there should be something morally fatal about his character - and seductively so as well - not just some external brand such as the mark of the beast. We spend the first series in the company of someone who makes it very clear he doesn't want what fate has given him, and as such he comes across in this sense as someone discovering something alien about himself (for a good comparison consider Mickey Rourke's character in the aforementioned Angel Heart). But should the anti-Christ really come across as fairly innocent. The latter part of the series begins to address this perhaps. But still where is the pride which precedes the fall?