Written by Kevin Cecil and Andy Riley
Directed by Ben Taylor
Starring Matt Berry, Freddie Fox and Susan Wokoma
Running time: Six episodes totaling about 2 hours and 20 minutes
Content warning: swears and occasional gory, gross imagery

by Benjamin Leonard, Best Boy and Rosalie Kicks!, Old Sport

Best Boy (BB): When asked if I wanted to review Year of the Rabbit, one of Matt Berry’s many, recent vehicles, my answer was “Of course!” Some of you will know Matt as Lasszlo from the recent TV series What We Do in the Shadows, but I’ve been a fan since I stumbled across videos of him online from the show Snuffbox (with Rich Fulcher) in 2006. Matt has quite a bit of skill at playing a loud-mouth, know-it-all, misogynistic douchebag that manages to get more laughs than outrage.  While his characters (and occasionally many other elements from the shows he is in) can be problematic, the viewer feels comfortable to laugh at how terrible it is because they are constantly being proven wrong and knocked down a peg.

Old Sport (OS): Matt Berry tends to play characters that often cause me to have the reaction, “did he really just say that?”. I agree with Ben though, as offensive as Berry’s characters often are, they aren’t the type of people that end up rewarded for such behavior. Instead they tend to be mocked, rarely taken seriously and given no sort of commendation. 

BB: Year of the Rabbit is no exception to that scenario. Matt plays Detective Inspector Rabbit, a drunken lout of a copper in Victorian London, who is teamed up with Wilbur Strauss, a rookie that is prone to being love-struck (Freddie Fox), and Mabel Wisbech, a foul-mouthed Black woman that no one really listens to but ends up being right so damn-many times that even these Victorian numbskulls have to take notice and they end up making her an officer as well (Susan Wokoma).

OS: What I loved about this storyline was the parallels to societal issues that we still face today, in particular are the gender role issues and problematic human behavior (*cough cough* white dudes I am giving you the side eye). Year of the Rabbit may be set in the late eighteen hundreds, however I found the characters and plotlines just as relevant today. The mix of personalities between the three leads creates an interesting dynamic that ends up making for a rather entertaining watch. 

BB: The unlikely trio make for a good team, both in crime-solving and comedy. While attempting to uncover what appears to be a massive secret society causing murder and mayhem, Rabbit’s experience and street-smarts gets them where they need to be, while Wilbur’s booksmarts fill in the gaps and Mabel’s ingenuity is able to stitch the two together to help them figure it all out. Of course, they aren’t able to manage it all on their own. There are the other coppers at the station as well as Rabbit’s old friend Joseph Merrick (yes, THE Joseph “Elephantman” Merrick) played in a hilariously catty manner by David Dawson. 

One of the many amusing aspects of the show is the way that it bounces back and forth from period dialog and scenarios to more modern day phrasings. The way Sally Phillips plays a Bulgarian Princess in a few episodes really cracked me up. Her demeanor and mannerisms are so out of context with the rest of the scene that it just plays as silly.

OS: The outlandishness of the show is what kept me interested. I’ll be honest, I don’t typically find this era of time to be of much interest, but Year of the Rabbit manages to have just the right amount of outrageous moments to keep me coming back. I was also quite impressed with the overall look, costume and production design of the series. Resurrecting a specific time in history, especially one that typically showcases drab and muted colors is never an easy feat but the team managed to make the sets realistic and appealing to look at. Which, for someone like me that fancies the vibrancy that technicolor offers, is saying something. 

BB: Overall, the show is fun and dumb with a pretty good buddy cop story and interesting crimes to solve. The cast is all great. Anything I’ve seen Freddie Fox in before wasn’t especially memorable, but he’s funny and cute and keeps you rooting for him here. I’ve totally missed the 14 years that Susan Wokoma has been acting, but she is exceptionally funny and saucy here. I’m looking forward to seeing other productions she’s involved with. In addition, the costumes and sets are pretty impressive for a six episode comedy series on British television. Like the Old Sport said, they are vibrant, but also a bit filthy, adding a note of realism.

Year of the Rabbit has been earmarked for a second season, and the story definitely left it open to expand further in the future, but there haven’t been any dates announced, so far. If it happens, I’d definitely check it out. You can check out the first season now on Topic. It’s a good diversion that doesn’t take much thought or emotional energy and pays off with some hearty laughs.