Natasha didn’t need to see her girls’ poker night ruined by a friend’s baby to convince herself she didn’t want kids. However, the heroine of The Babyplayed by Michelle de Swarte, will end up with a baby “literally fell from the sky”, abstract The New York Times.
This is the other headliner of the British series co-produced by HBO and Sky – broadcast by OCS in France since April 25: a seemingly charming baby, but who seems to be struck by a terrible curse. “The recurring gag is that people in contact with this nameless, unbearably cute toddler meet a violent end, continues the American daily. Except Natasha, the one who doesn’t want him, but can’t get rid of him.
Satire successful, but not always subtle
Another gag that supports the idea that “Tash” had every reason not to want to be a mother: her strong character makes her unpleasant with everyone around her, friends as well as colleagues in her restaurant, to the point of sometimes passing her off as “as immature as the baby who finds himself delivered to his care”, s’amuse The New York Times. But it is also what makes all the anguish of the situation.
The astonishing balance of comedy and horror gives its original tone to the series created by Siân Robins-Grace (Sex Education) and Lucy Gaymer. Without it being a parody (rather a dark satire), certain scenes really give chills. The whole works, judges the great American daily, which was able to see six of the eight episodes in advance. What to draw a “exploring the costs of motherhood, or, in this case, non-motherhood: the burden of not wanting a child when no one around you considers it an option”. And to analyze the difference in expectations when it comes to a couple of women like Natasha’s sister and her partner.
The only downside noted by the newspaper: some episodes suffer from a lack of subtlety when they “feel compelled to make explicit the themes addressed so far with finesse and skill”. Nothing to spoil the pleasure of the performance of the actresses in this absurd and disturbing universe, not so far from ours.