unchartedimages This mini-series shows none of the richness of these characters, and the pace is all wrong. I realize that there's only so much a TV show can do, but maybe it shouldn't even have been made if it does so little justice to what is an incredible novel.

ReganRebecca I have to admit, one of the only reasons I watched this is because I'm a huge fan of Romola Garai, but after the first episode I was completely hooked. It's well worth watching even if you don't care at all for any of the actors because everything about it is superb. The Crimson Petal and the White is based on a neo-Victorian novel by the stupendous writer Michel Faber. The wonderful thing about neo-Victorian works is that they can revisit the Victorian age without being constrained by all the things that the Victorians liked to keep under wraps, like frank sexual talk. This comes in handy in The Crimson Petal and the White which is focused a great deal on sex and sexuality. The main character is Sugar (Romola Garai, fantastic as always), a prostitute who has been working in the trade since she hit puberty (or maybe even before). Sugar has a deep distaste for men (she's working on a fantasy novel in which she tortures, maims, and kills her clients), but is well renowned because of her willingness to do anything (sexually speaking). She attracts the attention of William Rackham (Chris O'Dowd), a bumbling entrepreneur trapped in an unhappy marriage who is actually attracted to Sugar's mind as well as her body as she is self-educated and extremely literate and they both are well read. The more time Sugar and Rackham spend together the more they become obsessed with one another which leads to Sugar becoming more involved in Rackham's business and Rackham becoming concerned with keeping Sugar to himself. There is a lot more to the plot than that, but it's a wonderful tale. The aspects of Sugar and Rackham's personalities are set down early, and as the story unfolds we see these aspects play out. Sugar, who is tough minded and hard, is also incredibly smart, has the capacity to grow and change and also to love. Rackham is weak and selfish and these aspects are exposed as he faces difficult decision after difficult decision. The cast is excellent (special shoutout here to Chris O'Down whom I had previously only seen acting in comedies. He handles the darker material with ease putting to rest that lie about comedians not being able to handle anything but comedy). Beautifully shot and excellent costumes as you would expect from a BBC drama.

PippinInOz I have just finished watching the final episode today and - like another reviewer (jane) I did not want it to end. This has so much to recommend it. Although I am an avid appreciator of 'period drama' some of it, let's face it, is not brilliant is it? Yeah, okay it's watchable, but this, THIS is just fantastic, because:1. It has all the allusions to 18th Century 'tales' of 'fallen women in the big dirty London City' like Daniel Defoe's 'Moll Flanders' for example, but then adds something else, something new. 2. The something 'new' is an in your face representation of 1870s London. What a relief to see it how I imagined it to be. As a working class London girl who was lucky enough to study London Victorian life from a working class perspective it was exhilarating - and terrifying - to see what appears to me an accurate vision of the time and place. If you want servile happy poor folk who are 'everso grateful' to their betters, then go get a Disney version. This one goes for it. You can almost smell it - and it ain't nice, it ain't pretty. From the attempts by the prostitutes to prevent getting pregnant, the attempts to 'get rid of' unwanted pregnancies to the completely unsexy images of rich men f**cking in an alley way. 3. All of the acting is superb. Let us all thank God that the Americans never got hold of this for a film version. When Agnes thinks she sees her 'Angel' loitering in the street below the window, it is a play on the Victorian ideal of womanhood 'the angel in the house' - William Rackham's idealisation - and separation - of the two women in his life says so much that needed to be said about this often idealised time in history. The Angel in the House, particularly after Sugar moves into the home as Governess, means the Prostitute became the Angel in the House, if but briefly. 4. The one weak link for me was the character of Emmeline Fox played by Shirley Henderson. I am now reading the book and wonder why this character was made so two dimensional when her character really could have been sooooo much more. But hey......different texts, so if you haven't read the book, you won't care.5. When the body of Agnes is plucked out of the Thames, there are nods and winks to the Pre Raphaelite painting of 'Ophelia' - the woman driven mad by her lover who drowns herself. Art that was by Victorian males, judged by Victorian males and modelled by at least one prostitute. Also, a comment on the strange ideas of womanhood during this period - but by extension, the strange ideas right now. Yeah, it has changed, but has it changed as much as we like to believe? In this way it becomes a meditation on the past and the present.Highly recommended to everyone who loves a good yarn. Even more so to anyone who wants a warts and all depiction of the past. Romola Garai and Chis O'Dowd are just wonderful and should win at least a couple of awards for their efforts here. .....but everyone is good, special stars for Gillian Anderson as the collector of religious pictures who proves beyond any doubt she can play anything the director throws at her. Lovely performance. Also recommend the book upon which this is based. First rate.

jeanwinchester I rarely write reviews. However...within two episodes, the BBC licence this year has been worth paying. And with gratitude. Quite fond of a Victorian drama, everything about this series is magnificent. The detail–underarm hair on women, the ugly charm of London in the nineteenth century, the wide open shots of the streets simply for a scene where one woman walks across the road–offering a tantalising view that the viewer could actually be there, the lighting, the makeup, the production, the acting, the direction... I did not recognise Gillian Anderson at all and had to refer to my paper. How far she has come. Chris O'Dowd I thought was an odd choice to begin with–but how he fitted in. Robert Sterne has to be congratulated. It is without a shadow of a doubt that the next two episodes will not disappoint. I must rush out and buy the book. First class.