I May Destroy You episode 11 & 12 review, BBC review ★★★★★

With every episode of I May Destroy You, you can feel a shift: a change that ripples into the future. After half an hour, the world looks different – especially for the privileged, who can hide from certain distressing realities.

Creator/writer/director Michaela Coel has floated through issues of consent, rape, trauma, race, sexuality, class, gender, periods and partying via large-as-life characters that screech with realism. Despite being distant from everything Coel tackles (yes, even partying), this critic can’t remember another series that feels so undeniably tangible.

You can feel the glass of the bar where her character, Arabella, was raped. You can hear her shuffled breaths as she approaches a panic attack. The sting of awkwardness as she sends a stupid DM.


Photo: BBC/Various Artists Ltd and FALKNA/Natalie Seery

Coel provides all those details while employing such inventive narrative turns, re-organising time to better understand fraught pasts and anxious presents. The finale goes even further. Using a structural move that’s initially confusing, episode 12 turns into one of the most poignant and mind-bending episodes made in the last few years. Coel takes apart the formulaic wheels of television, challenging the form without a drop of pretension.

‘Do whatever you need to do to become the right person,’ says Arabella’s introverted flatmate Ben (Stephen Wight) in episode 11. It’s a message that seems to resonate through Bella, Kwame (Paapa Essiedu), and Terry (Weruche Opia). Bella’s persistent procrastination catches up with her and she needs to improve her motivation, Kwame tries to make amends for his questionable behaviour, and Terry finally lands a job.

The series rushes to wrap up its character arcs, but tackles them with the same absorbing mundanity that makes every episode so intrinsically watchable. All of them begin to learn ways of sweating out their worst qualities, especially Terry, who can be an interminable presence but occasionally reveals her kind side. Episode 11 also crafts some the best laughs, opening like a millennial flat-share comedy as Bella pursues one of her idols.

It’s a staple of the series to jump from humour to trauma in the blink of a scene change. Coel avoids those familiar minutes of dramatic set-up; the scars of the characters appear suddenly, out of nowhere. Memories tortured and buried come flooding back in jittery, nauseous flashes. They bleed into the finale, as Bella ponders what to do with them.


Photo: BBC/Various Artists Ltd and FALKNA/Natalie Seery

We’ve been warned against spoilers, and it’s easy to see why – how could anyone spoil such a marvel in modern television? But this critic can't avoid writing that Coel is a storm of a storyteller. The finale could easily not have worked: the approach could’ve been utterly incomprehensible. Without 11 episodes of build-up – setting up the vibes in the series, the disturbing places Coel ventures, and her intelligent command of narrative – I May Destroy You might have destroyed itself.

Instead, every element works as Bella is caught in a torturous, psychological chaos. It could be called surreal, but that’s rude to the reality Coel achieves. Bella’s trauma reaches beyond her control, but she tries to pursue a place of empathy, understanding, and acceptance. These two episodes strain in the art of letting go and, even though the trauma will never leave Bella, she can learn to dominate it, to stop it consuming her.

This funny, searing, and shocking series will be remembered for years to come.

I May Destroy You continues on Monday 13 July and Tuesday 14 July at 10:45pm on BBC One