Monday, June 21, 2021

What I’m Watching: Master of None (Season Finale)

Master of None: Season 3, Episode 5 “Moments in Love, Chapter 5” (B)

It’s hard to know whether this is going to be the series finale or if this show will return in some other form years from now, but for now, this is the last we’re going to see of it. I’m not sure why I expected some sort of satisfying finish that brought everything together and included more than a few sparse exchanges of dialogue, but the episodes leading up to this one were pretty informative in terms of content and structure. I do have a greater appreciation for the physical surroundings of the characters after speaking with production designer Amy Williams, so a return to a poorly-renovated cottage wasn’t a bad thing. But there wasn’t too much context about what’s going on in Denise and Alicia’s lives other than the little they said to each other, with them instead spending more time just being intimate and in each other’s company. Denise’s speech about feeling like a sheep while they were looking at the literal sheep on the farm was more about her than about the two of them, and the acknowledgment that they were in their old house trading stories about kids they have with other people started to bring things back to reality. The suggestion that they should just keep going until they got caught confirmed that they both knew that this couldn’t last, and that this “moment in love” didn’t necessarily apply to how their real lives look. It’s an interesting concept but not one that was as riveting as this show’s style and pacing tried to make it. The comedy-drama fusion present in the first two seasons often felt more poignant than this season’s hands-off approach, which wasn’t bad but at times felt a bit dry and lacking, especially compared to what came before it and despite a very strong performance from Naomi Ackie as Alicia.

Season grade: B
Season MVP: Naomi Ackie as Alicia

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