The Full Monty: The Full Season

August 4, 2023 6:57 AM - Season 1 (Full Season)

Twenty-six years later, the stars of the male dance revue that brought joy to Sheffield are... still in Sheffield, living quiet lives, still orbiting around each other. Warning: This is much, much less of a feel-good romp than the movie. It deals even more directly with painful subjects.

"But The Full Monty is far from a dutiful retread. It’s charming and deceptively humble, a far more effective tribute to a feel-good touchstone than simply running back the same beats." -- Alison Herman, Variety

"The saving grace to all this comes back down to the characters. There are plenty of rough edges to the storytelling, but you’re willing to go with it just to watch the guys go through some unexpectedly moving growth." -- Chase Hutchinson, Collider

"But nearly every episode, I found myself checking the run-time to realize that I was only halfway through. Even an amusingly devised episode involving a hostage situation overstays its welcome, its dry wackiness not offering nearly enough of the charm it needs." -- Nick Allen, RogerEbert.com

The Full Monty is streaming on Hulu in the US and Disney+ in the UK.

posted by Etrigan (1 comment total)

There's a lot of things to nitpick at (too many episodes, a little longer than it had to be, too stuck on "Here are the six guys (even though we can only get four of them for the whole series) you love!"). And, as I noted in the post, it is startlingly depressing with barely an uptick of optimism at the end of most of the story arcs. But I think if you go into it knowing that those issues exist and think of it as a loose sequel to the movie, it's a pretty good work.
posted by Etrigan at 7:11 AM on August 4, 2023