Gunpowder series finale review: ‘I must fight the course’

Gunpowder doesn’t really resolve any of its failings in its final episode, but at least it gives you something interesting to look at.

(Like the other two episodes of Gunpowder, the title of this review comes from Macbeth — Act 5, Scene 7 in this case.)

It says a little something about the pacing of Gunpowder as a whole that Robert Catesby and Guy Fawkes don’t have an actual, personal conversation (or at least an attempt at one), until partway through this, the final episode of the series. Granted, they have it surrounded by 6,000 pounds of the titular stuff, since they’re getting ready to carry out their plan, but at least they have it.

What I do also like about the opening 15 minutes is that, once again, Anne Vaux is the voice of reason … and yet again, no one listens to her. Liv Tyler could have carried a miniseries all on her own, but she makes a lot of hay out of the parts she does get in this episode, despite the slightly-out-of-nowhere part where apparently she and Father Garnet have some slightly mutual feelings of some sort? He leaves her with a ring and sacrifices himself.

Ultimately, everything is ruined because politics trumps religion for Spain, who betrays the plot directly to Robert Cecil. And so it is that halfway through the episode, William Wade and his men walk in on Guy Fawkes, fight him one at a time … and then Cecil steps on the lit fuse.

Slightly anticlimactic, sure, and more than a little silly, but it gets the job done. Anyway, they haul him directly before the king, still dirty and bloody, and Fawkes makes all the expected noises. Even when he’s tortured later and gives his name up after having his fingernails pulled out.

Kit Harington certainly plays a man afraid, though, when he hears that the plans have failed … only to go into his own version of St. Crispin’s Day (okay, that’s Henry V, but still, Shakespeare references haven’t failed me yet). It’s alternately loud and soft, and his Robert is afraid, but resolute. Even when the soldiers close in, he pulls himself together. “I mean here to die,” he says, his expression almost surprised by his putting it to words, but despite it, he and his men prepare for an attack.

And an attack we get towards the end of it all, which has plenty of smoke and gunshots … only for a stray shot to knock someone over and then knock a candle over … which causes a small explosion and fire. Really, Gunpowder? Shaken, seriously wounded, and with fire now threatening them, they draw their swords, exchange a last moment, and rush out screaming.

It gets even more ridiculous, if that’s possible, with the slow-motion fight scene after that. We all talk about how much we enjoy Harington’s hair, but it’s hard not to snicker as it flies through the air at half-speed. It just looks silly.

And, at the end of it all, Robert gets his wish to die there, instead of giving it all up. It kind of looks as though Harington’s breathing despite his character having died. The protagonists lose, except for Anne, who follows up on her promise to take care of his son. This, we learn by having Cecil speak to Garnet. It’s a bit of a clumsy way to wrap things up.

So too is the scene that juxtaposes the executions of the conspirators with Cecil’s reward from the king and the treaty being signed. Fawkes dies on his own terms, but the others … well, this time we see William Wade hold a heart aloft! That’s gross. Garnet is last to die.

Also, the model of Harington’s head looks goofy.

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However, the series ends on what might actually be a slightly hopeful note. As promised, Anne takes her cousin’s son away, a stone cross behind them to mark the lives of those who tried something.

All in all, Gunpowder‘s not really a bad series, it’s just an ultimately disappointing one that feels like it shouldn’t have been a full three-episode series. There’s some good acting here, make no mistake, but there’s just something off about it. It’s too stretched out.

What did you think of it?