Normal People BBC III - spoilers

I think I must be the only person in the world who didn't like this - gave it a few episodes but couldn't get into it at all.

I found this unusual in that I didn't like it at first (partly cos I always have problems believing adults playing people at school and suchlike) then grew to adore it and felt very sad to be leaving that 'world' behind at the end of the series. Stick with it as there is some excellent acting in later episodes as well as some beautiful scenery and great soundtrack moments!

That feeling that you “don’t belong” while in a crowd at school and then hoping you will at University...only to find that the same (but different) problem sort of follows you. And the heartbreak when he realises he can’t really go back to his old life either.....I thought the bit where he arrives on campus and looking round was amazing....just like I felt!
I also liked that they ended up not really being “cool” but being fine with that!

Thought it was good! Acting was very good indeed, and gorgeously filmed. Just not gushing over it in a “this is the best thing there's ever been” way as so many have done online. I've enjoyed other things far more recently, but not to put this down. Still very well done.

I adored the book on which this was based, and became obsessed with it very quickly. I loved spending time with the two main characters, and had a very strong emotional connection to them and the story, reading quite a lot of it through tears. I am still not entirely sure why this was the case (as someone else said above), but it must have hit on something within my subconscious. It is certainly not my usual thing. It is essentially a romance, and has quite a lot of sex (which I can be quite prudish about), but this is very much integral to the story in this. I read it very quickly, but did not want it to end. I have just got Rooney’s first novel, CONVERSATIONS WITH FRIENDS, and am looking forward to diving into that.

I loved this TV adaptation of NORMAL PEOPLE just as much. Very quiet, but beautifully acted and gorgeous to look at. Whilst nothing much really happens, it did not feel slow at all. The last 5 minutes of the series is perhaps some of the most moving pieces of film I have seen in recent memory. It absolutely shattered me, and I was in floods of tears. Again, not entirely sure why.

I did not know about the talk of a sequel. There have been a lot of questions about a second series being floated around for the TV series, with many of the creatives seeming interested in the idea, but I had not heard about Rooney considering writing another book. I do not know how I would feel about this. Whilst I would love to read something else with these two characters, I feel that the story ended perfectly and anything else would perhaps spoil that.

It was beautifully made and superbly acted. Though I don't think I could say I enjoyed it, I definitely appreciated it. I was moved to tears on a number of occasions throughout.

Paul Mescal is certainly one to watch, hopefully he has a big future ahead of him.

So @forrest , final episode last night; did you hold it together or floods of tears for you?

Have to agree. It's hard to pinpoint, but the central performances really drew you in and you were really invested in their lives. Here's hoping for series 2.

Sorry for missing this, it's so sweet of you to ask! :) 

I would love to say that I was a brave soldier, but... [I'd obviously be lying.]

I wish someone had made this series when I was half my current age: so that I could have fallen in love with it - and with the two of them them - unconditionally. Years between then and now have made me a bit older, grumpier and more disenchanted with the way some things work, although - if I am being quite honest - I probably still have my head in the clouds way more than I should. Also, I wish more shows when I was my much younger self made the effort to get across the point that not staying together isn't the end of the world. It is so refreshing to see that on screen somehow.
Having said that, perhaps Normal People and I did meet at the right moment, after all: for it to restore my faith in a bit of magic?

My favourite episodes were last week’s, though (9&10): his struggle with depression, her aloneness in Sweden. The idea of them caring so much for each other, despite the physical distance. That scene of sleeping with the laptop open, for safety.
My favourite thing about the series are the moments when things are left unsaid, its honesty about how hard it is to say what should be said sometimes, and about the consequences of those choices.

I have the feeling I will binge-watch it all again over the weekend.
I expected it to be lovely, due to all the praise, but in the end thought it was absolutely beautiful. 

(I hope they don't do another season, though. I thing everything that should have been said has been said in these 12 episodes.)

That's what worries me about it tbh. I thought the performances were excellent and the production values superb, but I'm dismayed that so many recent smash-hit series/books have female protagonists who are passive, gamine wet lettuces desperately needing a man to rescue them/validate their existence, or submitting to emotional and physical abuse in a glossy aspirational setting. Here, we have a female lead, supposedly super smart, who submits to abuse while looking incredibly chic in an Italian villa used in adverts and movies, and then photogenically tied up and prettily weeping 50 Shades style at the hands of a scandinavian photographer (seriously, if you asked teenagers what is the coolest job, photographer is one that's always been right up there.). And I think the production romanticises this, with its honeyed summer light and gorgeously dressed houses and characters: I've seen adult women on my Twitter feed desperate to emulate her hairstyle and whooping with joy at finding her exact hoop earrings. Apparently the book describes her as "luminously thin" too, with the sort of fetishistic language some readers have said feels like something from a Victorian novel (the 19thc novel loves suffering, pretty women) - lucky it's the sort of eating disorder that makes her look like someone from a 50s French film/Audrey Hepburn and not James Corden, eh?

Yes, all 6 hours of it. Apparently in the book her father is specified as abusive, but here it's left vague, a brief hint early on that was then contradicted by her apparently nostalgic preciousness over her father's glassware in the Call Me By Your Name episode (It's a small town, her Mum is actually the cleaner in her house every day, he has gone to school with her presumably for years - surely he'd know more than he does?) . And yes, I noted than Connell was laudably careful about ensuring her consent in the early episodes, and refreshingly upset that she wanted him to take her roughly from behind later on, but that doesn't make me feel any more happy about the way she was portrayed and the way audiences seem to think her doe-eyed helplessness is romantic. They are criticising Connell for not being her 'white knight' when his friends insult her or boyfriends bully her, rather than being angry that she - supposedly the smartest girl at school and college - doesn't stand up for herself and actively seeks out horrible men who hurt her. There's a short Twitter film made by an Irish performer skitting it - where she's asking him about wanting a cup of tea - that really summed up the series for me.

This is a character submitting herself to extreme abuse from men and it just wasn't explored enough why. Do young people in this post Twilight, 50 Shades, Fleabag world not see this as extreme any more? The semi-autobiographical series Patrick Melrose explored the rich, bright, self-destructive character with so much more depth and understanding.