The Harrowing

The first season sadly ends rather weekly.

Just another of the generic horror movies I like to compare this favourably to. There's plenty of great horror (this show is only one example) but still...I am yet to see any remotely good scary movie that has a gerund for a title.

The action is enlivened by the parodic characters and its funny tone but the plot is stolen from a thousand bland haunted house pictures without any kind of freshness and parody just turns to derivation.

i am really starting to like inside no.9 . from the first episode itself i was hooked to this series. and there were ups and downs as i went through this series.And coming to this episode i sincerely thought this one had a good atmosphere. but having watched it fully, i saw some wasted potential. other episodes , except last gasp, had cool twist but this one had a real potential for a jaw dropping twist but sadly they have wasted that potential and created an usual twist ending that we have all seen before

Overall this episode is good and has its moments but twist? no. is it good? yes of course my rating 6/10

The finale of series one has less comedy and goes for creeps and gothic horror.

Schoolgirl Katy has been hired to house sit as siblings Hector (Reece Shearsmith) and Tabitha (Helen McCrory) go out for the evening to attend an event.

Left upstairs in the house is their bedridden older brother, Andras who is extremely disabled but supposedly he will not bother Katy.

After they depart Katy's schoolfriend Shell turns up. With no mobile phone signal, Katy feels uncomfortable in a house with paintings depicting hell. She then hears a bell ringing from upstairs.

Inside No 9 episodes usually depicts a twist and both the main writers starring in it.

Here Steve Pemberton is missing and I assumed he would be playing Andras. The twist actually happens part way through and it's not that Hector and Tabitha are creepy and eccentric.

The ending is straightforward and dark which is both satisfying in the context of the story and also frustrating.

The budget was probably exceeded so this episode ended in a hurry. In fact, nothing remarkable happened in 30 minutes, except for a few sparks of humor, far from what we saw in the first 5 episodes. Nothing original, nothing to catch your eye, seems to have been made just for the pleasure of Pemberton & Shearsmith. It's a shame...

The Harrowing comes from a love and appreciation of the gothic horror genre. It is campy and silly in places, but with a creeping sinister edge, delving into demonic territory. Tabitha is a wonderful character and Helen McCrory played her perfectly. The same can be said for Katy, played by Aimee-Ffion Edwards.

There are some brilliantly absurd moments and classic misunderstanding humour, especially when thrusting a gothic horror into the modern day. The grotesque, horror elements are faithfully done, without taking away from the comedy. The twist isn't as stark as previous episodes, it does foreshadow and sow seeds, but not always very well done and some jokes fall a bit flat for me. Nonetheless, it was a fun episode and shift towards more supernatural elements.