Review: Barry

The short, spoiler-free review: I don't like TV very much, and I loved Barry. It's fat-free (four seasons, eight episodes each, each about a half-hour), hilarious, and on occasion, incredibly dark. If that combination appeals to you, I can highly recommend it.

Spoiler review:

I was originally going to stop watching at the end of season three, as I thought it was a natural place to finish the series. I'm glad I ended up watching until the end though, because it ties everything up so nicely. NoHo Hank was told from the beginning of season one that he's too soft, and toughens up by the series finale. Fuches was under delusions of adequecy, until he ends up beaten within an inch of his life in prison. Throughout the show, we're swinging back and forth on whether or not he's just a vindictive parasite living off Barry, or genuinely cares about him, and by the end, I think the answer is still somewhere in the middle. Sally wanted to be a movie star, and partially succeeded, shot herself in the foot, and is now relegated to regular life. Cousineau wanted his stardom back, and his narcissism costed him his freedom. I really enjoyed how the next generation of actors calls Sally out on perpetrating the same abusive practices Gene trained her on.

Finally, we come to Barry. I think for the first half of the show at least, I was fairly sympathetic for him; an incredibly flawed, broken man who is trying to be better, but is trapped by his own weakness/desire to please and manipulation by those around him. Not that any of that justifies his actions, but it at the least shows that he wants out. In the back half, and especially season four, it becomes very evident that he's entirely dedicated to self-preservation, something that has been true the entire series, but now without the thin veneer of a broken veteran. His fate is also incredibly fitting: in season two, he tells Mayrbek, one of the Chechen enforcers, that if he hesitates, he'll get killed. At the end of season two, Mayrbek hesitates when Barry barges into his room, and gets a bullet to the head. Likewise, Barry hesitates when he sees Cousineau at the end of season four, and meets an identical fate.

I loved all the gags about Hollywood, narcissistic personalities, comically incompetent police (of COURSE the series ends with the police accusing the wrong person, again), and Ronny and Lily. I loved the darker moments which contrasted the silliness: the bear in Bolivia, conversion therapy, the sand storage tube, the monastery massacre.

So, Barry: it's quick, clever, funny, and dark. Loved it, 5/5.