Nothing but Good Omens
Whilst the recent New York Comic Con produced a lot of info and trailers to keep fellow nerds glued to the laptop screen for days, something which served to capture the interest of many is the new trailer for Amazon Prime’s Good Omens. For those out of the know, Good Omens is a live-action adaptation of the 1990 novel Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch by kings of fantasy Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. This story centres on the cheery topic of the end of days, where the unlikely pairing of Angel Aziraphale and Demon Crowley team up to stop the war to end everything.
For those who have read the novel - despite the central topic - this book is filled with intelligent humour and absurdity, primarily owed to the chemistry between Aziraphale and Crowley, and their mutual desperation to prevent anyone from discovering how they intend to stop the Final Judgement. Having grown rather comfortable with their lives among humanity, the prospect of Armageddon isn’t quite as appealing as perhaps it was and the two go rogue to keep a watchful eye on the Antichrist and ensure he never initiates the Apocalypse. The endless wit and rapid-fire dialogue is given brilliant outlets in the two leads, David Tennant (Crowley) and Michael Sheen (Aziraphale), both of whom are perfectly suited to their roles and show wonderful promise for a dynamic and well-established bromance. Indeed, whilst this trailer allows us the briefest of glimpses of what the actors have to offer this show, the instant vibe is that it will be one of hilarity and reliability to these fantastical, out-of-this-world characters.
From the trailer alone, it appears that Crowley and Aziraphale take more of a centre stage to the TV series than they necessarily did for the book. Those who have read the novel (and if you haven't, we highly recommend doing so) are already aware that, whilst the Crowley and Aziraphale story is a highlight, it is one of multiple, intertwined plotlines which accumulate and lead to one big ending. With regards to the trailer many of the other plotlines are left as quick glimpses which is a slight shame, as the other story lines have also been cast well with big names such as Jon Hamm, Jack Whitehall, Frances McDormand, Mark Gatiss, and Nick Offerman also taking up roles in the series, which would have been nice to see. The mere presence of many of these names, however, provokes great anticipation for the portrayal of these other stories, which we hope have been given as much attention to detail as the relationship and characterisation of Aziraphale and Crowley. However, with Neil Gaiman himself authoring the scripts and acting as a showrunner for this series, (as a touching tribute to the request made by Terry Pratchett shortly before his death in 2015), how could we believe the end result to be anything other than faultless?
At the end of the day (or more appropriately world) this is a teaser trailer - emphasis firmly on the word ‘teaser’ - with much of the plot and major characters left to be revealed further down the line. However, from this little snippet alone, the end of the world has never looked so welcoming.
