UptownOracle in Film

Uptown Oracle Watches… A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Miserable Mill

The Miserable Mill: Part 1

This episode starts with Mr Poe panicking as he’s lost the children. I’m unsure as to whether I like that they focus more on Mr Poe than they did in the books, he seems a lot less like a secondary character now. Although I do love the actor, he’s portrayed perfectly to how Handler describes him.

The Baudelaires are soon kicked off the truck and have to walk to rest of the way to the mill, where they get to see the burnt down town of Paltryville. This is a new plot point, I cant remember this happening in the books, if I’m wrong please let me know. I kinda like this plot point because it makes the children question whether their parents are good or bad, which is vital in the future books as they discover VFD.

I enjoyed Phil’s positive attitude, as it created a small break in the desolateness of the Baudelaire’s lives, they even start to believe that Count Olaf wasn’t on his way to get them. Later Klaus thinks the new foreman is Olaf, yet Violet isn’t so sure because of this hope. Although they are both right in a way as he is not Olaf but he is one of the theatrical troupe. Both Phil and Charles were very well played, and true to their book counterparts. Although I liked Sir it was strange that there wasn’t more smoke around him, especially as some of the shows previous effects weren’t particularly life like anyway.

We meet Dr Georgina Orwell, a direct reference to George Orwell and his eye symbol and also Count Olaf’s ex girlfriend. Living next to the mill, Orwell hypnotises the workers to be obedient and not want pay, this plan works well for her but when Olaf mentions the Baudelaire’s and their fortune she starts creating a new plan with him.

As Klaus is trapped and hypnotised by Orwell due to his glasses being smashed, the parents ring the mill and are on their way to the children. They then appear at the doors just as Klaus is broken from his hypnosis. As the parents and children both go towards opening the door we are shown that this whole time the parents have been a fake out on the shows part. I sat here for a solid 5 minutes trying to comprehend that the Baudelaire parents were in fact dead after 7 episodes of thinking they were alive. I’m sure the Quagmire parents were used to link the Quagmires across the whole series and not just a couple of episodes, very similar to how VFD is ready within the first episode.

The Miserable Mill: Part 2

For the final episode we get another insight to Mr Poe, as he panics about not finding the Baudelaire’s and the risk of not getting a promotion. Although in the books hes very career focused, I don’t remember him being as indifferent to the Baudelaire’s well-being. His wife and sister in the books have been merged together for the series and she decides to use her investigative journalism skills to find the Baudelaire’s. Apparently the Poe family is going to be a bit more involved for the series.

The Baudelaire’s have found a friend in Charles as he agrees to give them information, but then he goes to Orwell’s office and gets hypnotised. As they watch from above, the children realise they need to find out the word to break the hypnosis. Later in the episode they realise this is ‘fire’ which is fitting for Orwell as she is assumed to be part of the fire-starting side of the schism. Theres a reference to VFD ‘very functional dictionary’.

Olaf breaks up with Orwell again, this time with the excuse of science fiction plot gimmicks being too much for his plans. I like how they can make fun of things a bit in this show. They changed the death of Orwell to falling backwards into a furnace rather than the log splitter. This is probably due to the gruesome nature, there would have been a lot more blood if the original way was used. I’m also quite happy they didn’t go ahead with sunny fighting as I’ve really disliked her edited scenes such as the biting at the beginning.

Back at the Quagmires they discuss the Baudelaire fire and then send the children to bed. Father takes his spyglass out of the drawer and then as he leaves someone sets fire to the room. The big question is who is the woman in the big hat? Could it be Esme Squalor? Or is it someone else?

As Mr Poe has been promoted to VP of Orphan Affairs, the Baudelaire’s are going to boarding school. With the spyglass returned by Jacquelyn they end the season with a mordbidly positive musical number. As the children sing on the other side of the bench is the aformentioned Quagmires with a spyglass of their own. We also find out that Lemony and Olaf were childhood friends at school, I think this is also different from the books, but I enjoy that there’s a chance for the Baudelaires to start learning more about Olaf and hopefully VFD from the start of the next series.

What did you think of the series? I cant wait until next series to see how much else they change. Hopefully we will also see if Jacquelyn is really called Jacquelyn.