Streaming Review – Good Omens

Based on the wonderful and witty novel by Neil Gaiman and the late Terry Pratchett, Good Omens is a beautiful and dizzying satire on scripture, faith, destiny and partisanship.  In it, fastidious angel Aziraphale (Michael Sheen) and swaggering demon Crowley (David Tennant) are each tasked by their respective higher-ups in heaven and hell to track down the Antichrist – who’s not where he’s supposed to be – so that Armageddon can begin, as scheduled.  Thing is, both Aziraphale and Crowley, who have been walking among us ever since Adam and Eve, have grown attached to the ways of humans and in fact have no earthly (nor heavenly nor hellish) desire to see the End Times commence.  Good Omens captures the mischievous, irreverent spirit of Gaiman and Pratchett’s opus, and nails the tone, from the lighthearted, nonchalant title cards advising us that the end of the world will be happening in 37 minutes, to the portrayal of both heaven and hell as the worst corporate-level bureaucracies ever, rife with incompetence and smug middle-management types.  You’ve got kindly witches and barely-qualified witch-hunters, dim-witted satanic nuns and the Harley-riding Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.  And the whole enterprise is grounded by a winning pair of performances from Sheen and Tennant, as two old friends who manage to bring out the naughty and nice in each other in their efforts to forestall the end of all things.  A more damned divine bromance you’re not likely to find.