A Few Notes on the GAVIN AND STACEY 2024 Christmas Special Finale

Obviously I am nothing but thrilled they made this finale, there were lots of laughs and let’s be honest, more than anything else we all just want all these great characters we know & love so much all together in one place, no matter what the reason. And while there’s no amount of money I wouldn’t immediately hand over for another 90 minutes with them, there were some things that are just too big to ignore:

Who made the decision to turn Uncle Bryn into some sort of unhinged monster that we instantly hate? I shouldn’t be surprised – one of the all-time funniest Bryn moments was in the Gwen surprise party episode when he SNARLED at whatshisface about the secret plans for the party. It was hilarious both in its execution and in it being the only time Bryn had done anything like that. So years later during the 2019 Christmas finale when he started out sniping at everybody because of the pressure from cooking Christmas dinner for 13 people, my spidey senses were tingling with apprehension that this is what Bryn was just turning into, but as quick as it took for Bryn to totally nail the Christmas dinner he was back to being the Bryn we all know & love, and I was relieved.

Which lasted as long as 0 seconds after Uncle Bryn first walks onscreen in the finale, when suddenly he’s unhinged, screaming/ranting Bryn. And then it gets worse, the only other real scenes featuring him we see him losing his shit at Gwen because she’s dating Dave Coaches before somehow turning into conniving…evil Bryn…? My worst fears were realized; like me they were in love with that brief moment from Bryn about 16 years ago but unlike me they could do something about it, and unfortunately chose to do just that.

TOO MUCH DAWN & PETE!! D & P are the archetypal sitcom characters whom we all absolutely love to see but if it’s all about them for one second too long it pretty much ruins it; particularly when the couple’s entire raison d’etre is a one-note joke which was always fine as long as it was brief in which case this was, unfortunately, not. ALSO: I don’t know if it was on purpose and if it was it’s really funny but Pete – newly single, hittin’ the clubs Pete -looks like Van Gogh’s self-portrait.

Again with the “Stacey is worried she & Gavin are losing their heat in the romance department” shit??? How many times are they going back to the well with this – hey dummies these two are easily the most boring part of the show and even trying to make me tell myself them reflecting on their own boringassness is some sort of meta on top of meta magic tv shit doesn’t make it any easy to fucking try to sit through. AGAIN.

The Gwen & Dave Coaches thing was a bit ridiculous, but we absolutely love Dave Coaches and we should all be happy to see Gwen happy for once instead of churning out omelets for people who just shit on her. But we’re really supposed to believe they kept it secret on Barry fucking Island for 6 months?? With Uncle Bryn, aka Gladys Kravitz, keeping the goddam neighborhood watch alive all by himself? I’ll be honest though, those 5 seconds waiting for Gwen’s secret boyfriend to be revealed as he walked down the stairs made steam come outta my brain from trying to guess who it would be, spinning through my mental rolodex to remember every single male who’d ever appeared on the show, and I still somehow totally missed it was Dave Coaches. 😜 And again – we love Dave Coaches but does he call EVERY woman he dates sugar-tits?

I was gonna dismiss my “dafuck is up with the Brits and these fucking foam parties?’ as it being wildly after my own time, but James Corden and Matthew Horne are only 5 years younger than me so it’s not like I’m asking “dafuck is up with Euphoria this week guys?” And just as when it occurred in an earlier episode, the release of the foam was synced to reflect some sad moment of reflection...why?

Just like the last Christmas special, the kid playing Neil the Baby was just really, really great to see. Mostly I guess because he was the original baby in the series so there’s a longtime connection, which you can see by how much both Corden & Ruth Jones seem to have a real affection for him; Jones in particular had her most real, sentimental moments of the entire series with him.

British National Treasure SHERIDAN SMITH YAAAAAASSSSSS!!! After not being invited to the Christmas Party in 2019, Rudy Rudester came in blazing as if shot out of a cannon and just totally crushed her one minute onscreen. Perfect!

Alison Steadman gets more legit laughs just with a look than anyone I can think of. Incredible.

Which brings us to the main, glaring problem of the episode: why were Smithy & Sonia getting married? Even from her side – why is she marrying Smithy? She’s over-the-top posh, and he’s whatever the opposite of over-the top posh is. So it’s not money, or some sort of “oh shit I’m 35 now so I need to pair off with one of the bachelors at the Country Club” thing. And we know it’s not a looks thing, it’s not like she’s “I mean damn he looks like Brad Pitt so whatevs” – Smithy’s not exactly a GQ model, but you can see him landing a woman who’s as out of his league as Sonia is because he’s so fun and cool and warm-hearted, but Sonia seems to hate all those things about him and the only time she references his looks is how fat he is, so…why is she marrying him?

But it’s even more absurd that Smithy would want to marry her. Look, five years ago when part of the plot revolved around them having been dating for almost an entire year (only “11 months!”) without ANYONE – EVEN GAVELAR!! meeting her was easily waved away since we were meeting her so she was new to us, and nobody thought they’d stay together ten minutes after the episode anyway, so nobody really cared about the absurdity of it all.

But even if you can wrap your head around that back in 2019 and be cool with it, how are we supposed to believe that five years later everything’s the exact same??? In 2024 they’ve been together for five years, are about to be married, and STILL nobody knows her at all? So Smithy knows enough to keep her away from everybody because he knows they’ll hate her, largely because she hates him, and yet it never occurs to him to run thing by anybody? And everybody who is now questioning the wedding had FIVE FUCKING YEARS to say “hey you know what Smithy, this whole thing is weird” but they didn’t…

…leading to the most-cringeworthy moment of the entire series, which was obviously meant to tug on the heartstrings for all eternity but made me🤮 . But besides being so corny in & of itself, it also revealed the cracks in the whole affair – after keeping a stiff upper lip and refusing to confront Smithy for five years, everybody’s willing to now make a stand in the most public, conspicuous and embarrassing moment possible? This is supposed to be a touching moment between Smithy & Mick but – unlike Mick’s stag night speech which was blow-the-doors-off beautiful – it just felt extra stupid. And again, this is after 5 fucking years!! – it’s not as if Smithy & Sonia just met a week ago and everybody’s rightfully concerned they’re rushing into things.

And besides, after everybody else in the church stood up and said “yeah so I think this weeding shouldn’t happen”, if Mick had remained seated would everybody really have gone “well that’s that, let’s continue with the wedding ceremony please”?

But the most curious part may be in the same dramatic moment we see in movies & tv shows all the time, when one character tacitly tells another that yes they’re still in love with them and know they belong together but it can’t happen because they’re already committed to someone else, and all of our hearts break for the both of them.

In this case Smithy sadly lets Nessa know that he’s still in love with her, and then they both give each other knowing nods/looks into each other’s eyes that reminds us that theirs is a love that will tragically never be allowed to happen…except that 1) he & Nessa have a child together, have a history together, are now openly saying to each other they belong together and 2) cutting ties with Sonia will pretty much have zero affect on anything or anybody since Smithy spent five years keeping everybody away from her anyway, so….why is any of this happening again…? 🤔🤷‍♂️

Of course I've already watched it three times and will spend every Christmas wishing there was another episode; it's just frustrating because I love the show so much, but I'm grateful we'll always have so much of it to enjoy as well. LONG LIVE GAVIN AND STACEY AND SMITHY AND NESSA AND UNCLE BRYN AND JASON AND MICK AND PAM AND DAWN AND PETE AND GWEN AND DAVE COACHES AND NEIL THE BABY!!!!!!