User Reviews

A brilliant return after a wait that long sometimes a series shouldn't return. A very good laugh a minute episode. Great writing really funny and beautifully captured the time it set in. Which is what made the show great to begin with. Felt like an episode that could have been part of series 1. With returns of all the great characters and a guest appearance to. The bar is set high hopefully the rest of the series is this good.

I think the 'child' characters are being way more overacted by the actors and actresses than they were, Erin and Clare especially. All of the adult characters are still funny and believable. The storylines are not quite as good so it's probably best that this is the last season plus, schoolgirl Clare is played by 35yr old Nicola Coughlan. It's like Grease.

This episode is a move into the future where the girls have aged quite a bit. It centers around their fear that they have failed a critical exam that will determine their futures. So the decide to break into the school to try to find the results. They unwittingly surprise some burglars who are robbing computer equipment. They actually assist them in loading the stuff into their van. They are arrested and brought to the police station where Liam Neeson is playing the chief inspector. But the have a secret weapon to help them get out of their situation. In a parallel plot element, the old man has taken in a feral cat that has been killing every small animal in the neighborhood. Once again, it leads to duplicity, and more harassment of Gerry.

...how can one beat that?

The episode begins with a montage of The Troubles and sensitive Erin's apprehension on the hoped-for peace to follow.

The girls sneak into Our Lady Immaculate College late at night. They do this to find out how they have done on their exams because they are very nervous about them. At a chance encounter that day headmistress Sister Michael in her usually feigned indifference implies they did not do well. After gaining entry into the school, they are unwittingly enlisted to participate in a burglary which they had interrupted. The girls are subsequently taken into custody.

After an anxious (and funny) ride to the station house, during interrogation the first thing that comes through is the deep mistrust of the R. U. C. (police) by the Catholic community. Interestingly though, the R. U. C. Is not portrayed as a one-dimensional adversary, instead it is humanized as officers trying to do their best under the difficult circumstances of the times. Especially so with the world-weary Chief Constable Byers well-played in a cameo by actor Liam Neeson.

A second story line is Seamus, a feral cat taken in by Erin's family patriarch Joe "Da" McCool. It seems Joe refused to put a bell on Seamus even as it is found to be a great slayer of wildlife. Finally, after Seamus kills a neighbor girl's pet rabbit, Joe relents and the cat gets a collar and a bell. I hope this reviewer is not making too much of it, but I see the untamed cat as an allegory to 20+ years of violence and mayhem and mutual antipathy in Northern Ireland. To me, the collar and bell represent the peace process/Good Friday Accords and ties things into Erin's talk of cautious hope that opens the episode.

As these two story lines unfold the actors as usual play their well-defined characters with great comedic skill.

I really enjoyed the previous series of Derry Girls but this is a bad sign for whats to come in the final season.

The series started off quite low key, low budget show that was quite subtle in its humour. It was mainly wordplay that was its charm.

However season three appears to be the monster that success has unleashed. It looks as if the cast and production team have started to believe their own hype. There is an arrogance to the new series as if they can do no wrong. The main cast seem to have gone off the scale in terms of their acting. Overacting is too soft a word, its like their are doing a parody of their own characters and it feels forced. They now look like adult women playing these roles while in the past they were more believable as teens.

Strangely though the rest of the cast, probably through experience have managed to maintain their professionalism. If it wasn't for them I would have switched off.

The problem is that its unlikely that this will be a one off issue.

The use of cameos is also another sign the show is getting too big for its boots. It never needed these in the past and it was an unwelcome distraction. Also the use of what is basically a cancelled actor for racist comments seems bizarre. As if the fact he is Irish seems to negate his scandal.

Even the use of music seems to have changed, now we only hear opening bars of some songs which don't appear that relevant while in the past long extracts of songs were used which were relevant to the scenes and seemed to add to the emotional punch of what was going on.

I think once the overall excitement of the return of the show is over people will start to notice the changes which have made the show worse.

It just seems to take others a bit longer to catch on....

Awful and stupid episode. Totally ran out of story ideas. Overacting getting REALLY annoying, especially by Claire! And what's wrong with Orla's voice!!