Expedition Hits a Snag - The Terror / First Four Episodes

Go for Broke *** / ****
Gore ***
The Ladder ***½
Punished, as a Boy ***

On Saturday I binged the first four episodes (Go for Broke, Gore, The Ladder, & Punished, as a Boy) of the AMC Arctic horror limited series, The Terror (one of two English Naval ships produced by “The Empire”, the other being Erebus), about an expedition “into the North” in the hopes of developing an economic route through the Northwest Passage to China and India which is interrupted and doomed thanks to “pack ice” that freezes them into stoppage.

Not only the ice and freezing conditions (food shortage, cabin fever, alcoholism, and developing tensions between those among the crew resulting) are cause for concern but, during a search for a route to escape the Arctic, a small group comes across an Inuit father and daughter. The father is accidentally shot in the dark of night when Gore, leader of the search party, mistakes him for a bear they believe is following them. Soon after a creature begins to hunt them down and eviscerate them one by one. I laughed aloud when trailers for the show has a critical praise calling The Terror a “sophisticated” horror show followed by severed heads and body parts of the Naval crewmembers strewn across icy white.

 Ciarán Hinds is the leading officer of the expedition, Sir John Franklin, his ship the Erebus while Jared Harris (an actor I have always liked, just recently started watching him when featured on Mad Men) commands the second ship, the Terror. Harris’ Captain Francis Crozier just signed on to the expedition to secure the hand in marriage of Franklin’s niece, although Franklin didn’t approve of him as a proper suitor for her. While Franklin embraces the pomp and circumstance of being a celebrated explorer (as is his second-in-command, Commander Fitzjames (Tobias Menzies), also basking in the limelight such lofty applause that being recognized in a crowded theater of your peers brings), Crozier hates it. Crozier doesn’t have the poetic prose of a Captain Franklin, notable for putting effort into grand speeches to men under his command. Crozier, when Franklin is mutilated by the creature in the third episode (while visiting men in a tent camp awaiting the creature, including taking a photograph with them in a pose) and tossed into a watering hole, must assume total command, sinking into his booze as men continue to die and the inability to move (Crozier warned Franklin they needed to change course, altering the time line which would have slowed them down) gradually deteriorates conditions.

 Not helping is rogue Cornelius Hickey (Adam Nagaitis), a secretive homosexual (this sexual orientation is emphasized when a liaison with a superior is frowned upon, as Hickey is determined to be a sinner in need of discipline)  crewman looking to advance in rank and profile anyway he can. In the fourth episode, Hickey takes it upon himself to recruit two other officers and go after the Inuit daughter who lost her father to the bullet that ultimately killed him. This Inuit young woman, dubbed Lady Silence (Nive Nielsen) when she no longer speaks after her father’s death (she wanted him moved out of the ship and onto the ice before he were to pass), seems connected to the creature. In her igloo, the creature breathes hard on the other side of a hanging cloth serving as a curtain of sorts and leaves a dead seal for food…and the creature doesn’t go on the attack until after the death of Lady Silence’s father.

 The atmospheric conditions of the location, the way the creature moves about often undetected and ghosts them (ripping them asunder and remaining free of harm), and the psychological deterioration/warfare that often pits those stuck in the Arctic against each other really have captivated me. I also appreciate the attention to detail (to the period, how the ships are under operation, and the officer protocol), and little trips back to England to see how Franklin and Crozier ended up in the Arctic. The ships themselves are detailed as are the costumes to fit the era, with special mention to the way the officers speak and handle themselves while stranded on the ice, often either waiting for some hope of rescue or their own demise. The show, after the first four episodes, does seem to indicate the creature and Lady Silence are linked somehow. Considering Lady Silence and her Eskimo people are home to the Arctic North, the creature’s existence among them would seem to recognize a kinship between them. The Aurora Borealis is highlighted (I was expecting this, and don’t blame the creative team for using it for aesthetic reasons) to further enhance the idyllic beauty within the environs of a location that promises anything but…horror (and the potential for it…) appears to be all that those stuck in the Arctic recognize. Franklin and Crozier’s little talks are often of the “say enough to get the point across while remaining diplomatic and aristocratic in nature” but the tension and angst is almost always there…because they are so significantly different, they remain at odds. I wish this could have lasted a bit longer than three episodes but the dramatic results of Franklin’s demise served to establish just how scary a threat the expedition’s crew is up against.

Incredible scenic canvas, with good use of bloody ice, wintry climate forboding, the chill of the Arctic always relevant and seemingly uncompromising; The Terror never fails to reiterate the situation as unpleasant and daunting. Memorable moments include a dive underwater to free stuck ice locking up the Erebus with the diver seeing something coming towards him, actual communication in the Inuit language between Crozier and Lady Silence, and a visceral autopsy to determine a scurvy potential threat.