Inside No. 9 reaches Series 9, and possibly the end, in quite some style
“We haven’t just seen Lesley Manville in an amateur production of Kinky Boots“
After a decade and more than 50 episodes, Inside No. 9 comes to an end – on the small screen at least – with Series 9. I’ve kinda loved bingeing my way through the whole thing over the last few months and whilst there were obviously moments when it would have been good to be watching at the time, finding my own way through without all the chatter around it has actually worked really well for me.
Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton’s dark comedy anthology doesn’t really switch up the formula here at this late stage, continuing with a series of highly effective standalone stories that flit effortlessly from genre to genre but always twisting up our expectations as it explores something fascinating about human behaviour. From train carriages to escape rooms, Edwardian country houses to contemporary suburbia, all too often we can find ourselves in here.
Boo To A Goose kicks things off well, reminding us that nothing good can come from talking to other people on public transport, Mark Bonnar and Siobhan Finneran particularly good in this twisty social experiment and the escape room episode CTRL, ALT, ESC also crackles with tension in its eerie unfoldings led by Katherine Kelly. Best of all is Mulberry Close, told almost exclusively through door-cam footage with Dorothy Atkinson, Vinette Robinson and Adrian Scarborough all on top form.
Final episode Plodding On does nod to the occasion as it features a wrap party for Inside No. 9 with a suite of returning actors brightening up our screens as Shearsmith and Pemberton’s relationship begins to crack under the strain of deciding what to do next. It is wonderfully meta, with everyone sending themselves up (or are they, maybe Anne Reid is indeed a coke fiend) and perhaps wisely, it aims for celebratory rather than clever-clever, featuring clips alongside a vast number of previous cast members recognising quite what the televisual feat this has been.
