Assessment: Pitch-perfect Renegade Nell is a gem of a sequence you received’t need to miss

Award-winning British TV author Sally Wainwright is finest recognized for the dramatic sequence Blissful Valley (2014–2023) and Gentleman Jack (2019–2022), the latter produced collectively by BBC and HBO. Wainwright partnered with Disney+ for her newest sequence, the resolutely PG-13 Renegade Nell, which is a unique beast altogether: old school, swashbuckling comedian journey with a supernatural twist, that includes a sassy cross-dressing heroine compelled to show to freeway theft to outlive.

(Some spoilers beneath, however no main reveals.)

Set in 1705 throughout the reign of Queen Anne (Jodi Might, Gentleman Jack), the sequence stars Louisa Harland (Derry Ladies) as Nell Jackson. Nell is a headstrong younger lady with tomboy aptitude and a style for journey who returns house to her village of Tottenham after operating off 5 years earlier than to marry one Captain Jackson towards her father’s needs. She’s now widowed and possessed of occasional supernatural expertise each time somebody threatens her, courtesy of a fairy sprite named Billy Blind (Nick Mohammed, aka Nathan from Ted Lasso), who has been tasked to guard Nell. Nell’s household thought she’d been killed on the battlefield alongside her husband, so her homecoming is a little bit of a shock.

Alas, Nell quickly runs afoul of 1 Thomas Blancheford (Jake Dunn), the louche, drunken offspring of the city’s landlord, Lord Blancheford (Pip Torrens, Preacher). Let’s simply say issues escalate, and Nell quickly finds herself on the run and framed for homicide, alongside together with her two sisters, Roxy (Bo Bragason) and George (Florence Eager), and the Blanchefords’ former groomsman, Rasselas (Enyi Okoronkwo, The Lazarus Venture). The group will get additional help from an enthralling aristocratic dandy/secret highwayman named Charles Devereaux (Frank Dillane, The Essex Serpent).

Nell simply desires to evade seize lengthy sufficient to search out an sincere Justice of the Peace to clear her identify. Within the course of, she finds herself battling the formidable black magic of the Earl of Poynton (Adrian Lester, Euphoria) and his acolyte, Thomas’ sister, Girl Sofia (Alice Kremelberg, The Sinner), and stumbles upon a sinister plot to dethrone the queen.

The writing, pacing, and manufacturing values are top-notch, and the solid is terrific throughout the board. Lester brings a ruthless authority to Poynton’s spooky supernatural machinations, whereas Kremelberg is all seething bitter resentment and steely resolve as Girl Sofia, a superb, formidable noblewoman (additionally widowed) who is much extra certified to run the household property than her nugatory brother, but prohibited from inheriting by the legal guidelines of the time. Dillane’s Devereaux gives a lot of the witty repartee and comedian aid, as does Joely Richardson’s (The Sandman) newspaper magnate, Girl Eularia Moggerhanger. And Ashna Rabheru (Purple Rose) is pleasant as a spoiled younger aristocrat, Polly Honeycombe, with a vigorous romantic creativeness who longs for one thing extra in life than an organized marriage.

Nevertheless it’s Harland’s sensational portrayal of Nell that anchors all of it. It is a function that requires her to be a tricky rebellious tomboy in a single scene and sport a fancy accent and fancy gown in one other; to stability motion comedy with moments of real worry and heartbreaking tragedy. It is also a extremely bodily function: Harland underwent a number of months of stunt coaching previous to filming. She does all of it with refreshingly unpretentious aplomb.

Renegade Nell retains the motion flowing and correctly by no means takes itself too significantly. Certain, there may be injustice, class warfare, and powerful clever ladies chafing inside the strict confines of conventional binary gender roles—and Polly Honeycombe positively qualifies as bicurious. However Wainwright by no means lets the story get slowed down in heavy-handed symbolism or didacticism. Even Nell’s cross-dressing is dealt with with the lightest contact. Requested to touch upon her character’s gender politics, Harland informed the Guardian that there was no ulterior motive or agenda: “Why does she gown as a person? To cross as a person.” Easy as that.

Will we see extra of feisty Nell and her delightfully eccentric compatriots? That is as much as Disney. There are many questions left unanswered and positively extra tales to inform, each previous and current. Sequence director Ben Taylor informed Radio Instances simply after the premiere {that a} second season was presently being written and that it will doubtless contain some sort of time leap (on condition that a number of the youthful actors will visibly age), choosing up with the assorted surviving characters from the place they left off within the first season. However Disney has but to substantiate this. This is hoping this sequence finds the broader viewers it so richly deserves. We’re rooting for you, Nelly… err, Nell.

Renegade Nell is now streaming on Disney+.