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Shamed is a one-off “What’s going on?” drama, where one minute, we see Nathan (Nick Blood, above) happy with fiancee Julia (Tanya Fear), and the next, he’s locked up in a small, red room; waking up and seemingly drugged, and unable to escape. What happened? It’s certainly not quite the stag party he was expecting…
I won’t go into any more detail than I witnessed in the trailer, but with Nathan locked away, and Sarah (Faye Marsay) on the other side, controlling what’s going on, it feels like some sort of sick, twisted fantasy for her, as she’s screwing with his mind. Presumably, he’s done something to require being named and shamed, but what?
Before the first ad break comes, he shouts that he wants to know what the person on the other side of the door wants… which is replied to with a note slipped under door: “Everything that you took from me”.
Like Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi, the less you know about this the better, so I’ll refrain from saying too much, but also like that film, the anticipation and the concept is better than the execution, as they rather peter out the longer as they goes on.
Shamed felt like it was trying to be a great Black Mirror-style episode, but it didn’t work out that way. I couldn’t fathom how we were supposed to guess what the final act would be, even though the characters had seemingly figured it out.
Also, using technology and the internet in this, I was reminded of Maisie Williams’ Cyberbully, but that was a far better drama. In fact, I really didn’t quite get where this was meant to be going. It was all set-up and no pay-off.
Shamed is broadcast on Channel 4 on Tuesday at 9pm, and can then be viewed on All4, but isn’t yet available to pre-order on Blu-ray or DVD.
Score: 4/10
Director: Anthony Philipson
Producer: Rachel Wardlow
Writer: Anthony Philipson
Cast:
Sarah Ivy: Faye Marsay
Nathan Bowyar: Nick Blood
Mani Yalla: Ryan McKen
James Ivy: Mark Quartly
Julia Lourde: Tanya Fear
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.