✕ ✕
Turning tips into memories
Login
Signup

You have reached the limit of free articles.


To enjoy unlimited access to Culture Whisper sign up for FREE.
Find out more about Culture Whisper

Please fix the following input errors:

  • dummy

Each week, we send newsletters and communication featuring articles, our latest tickets invitations, and exclusive offers.

Occasional information about discounts, special offers and promotions.


OR
LOG IN

OR
  • LOG IN WITH FACEBOOK

Thanks for signing up to Culture Whisper.
Please check your inbox for a confirmation email and click the link to verify your account.



EXPLORE CULTURE WHISPER
✕ ✕
Turning tips into memories
Login
Signup

Please fix the following input errors:

  • dummy
Forgot your username or password?
Don't have an account? Sign Up

OR
  • LOG IN WITH FACEBOOK

If you click «Log in with Facebook» and are not a Culture Whisper user, you agree to our Terms & Conditions and to our Privacy Policy, which includes our Cookie Use

Support Us Login
  • Home
  • Going Out
    • Things to do
    • Food & Drink
    • Theatre
    • Visual Arts
    • Cinema
    • Kids
    • Festival
    • Gigs
    • Dance
    • Classical Music
    • Opera
    • Immersive
    • Talks
  • Staying In
    • TV
    • Books
    • Cook
    • Podcast
    • Design
    • Netflix
  • Life & Style
    • Beauty
    • Fashion
    • Gifting
    • Wellbeing
    • Lifestyle
    • Shopping
    • Jewellery
  • Explore
  • Shopping
  • CW SHOPS
  • Support Us
  • Get Started
  • Tickets
  • CW SHOPS
Get the Best of London Life, Culture and Style
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
TV

Killing Eve, season 4 episode 1, BBC One review ★★★★★

28 Feb 22 – 28 Feb 23, ON BBC iPLAYER

The globally thrilling BBC spy drama with Jodie Comer and Sandra Oh reaches its final chapter. Fiona Shaw and Camille Cottin also return

By Euan Franklin on 20/2/2022

2 CW readers are interested
Jodie Comer in Killing Eve season 4, BBC One (Photo: BBC)
Jodie Comer in Killing Eve season 4, BBC One (Photo: BBC)
Killing Eve, season 4 episode 1, BBC One review 3 Killing Eve, season 4 episode 1, BBC One review Euan Franklin
Contains spoilers for Killing Eve, season three.

Villanelle’s found God, and Eve doesn’t want to know. That’s the stage we’ve reached with Killing Eve, the silly cat-and-mouse espionage thriller originally adapted for the screen by Phoebe Waller-Bridge. It's now being concluded by Sex Education alumnus Laura Neal in the fourth and final season, in which Jodie Comer finally says goodbye to the killer role that made her an international name.


The escapades with Eve (Sandra Oh) hunting Villanelle, or vice versa, haven't yet resumed their former excitement, mostly reduced when Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman) left after season two. Many would argue, perhaps rightly, that Waller-Bridge’s exit was the contributing factor to its lost magic. The series endured a strange devolution, punctuated by a few decent episodes with sabre-toothed dialogue and amusing performances.


It’s usual for a series as big as Killing Eve to run out of steam eventually, but to achieve that undesired feat so quickly is (frankly) weird. However, in the first episode of season four, Neal keeps the writing punchy and the performances retain much of their ridiculous allure – thankfully preventing an exhausting experience.



Villanelle (Jodie Comer) finds God. Photo: BBC

The opening scene becomes Tarantino-esque when Eve visits her old frenemy and Villanelle’s ex-employer Konstantin (Kim Bodnia). Neal wrote the funniest episodes in season three, and she resumes her pitch-black sense of humour here. It’s easy to see why she was promoted to showrunner.


Apparently, the union that concluded the last season – where Eve and Villanelle turned to face each other in a strangely sentimental romcom moment – didn’t amount to much after all. Eve is seeing a bloke she works with; Villanelle lives with a vicar and his smitten daughter, hoping to find salvation and forgiveness from a God she doesn’t believe in. The latter wears crimson church garb with a frilly white ruff in her first scene, as if nodding to the Waller-Bridge fans who fondly remember the Hot Priest in Fleabag.


Villanelle hasn’t disclosed her murderous past to those innocent parties, but there’s a clear effort to change herself. This is shown during a dissatisfyingly unlethal scene between her, Eve, and a fish tank – resembling the famous meet-cute in Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet. This season’s shaping into another post-break-up analogy: Villanelle’s trying to show she’s changed, but Eve sees nothing different.



Eve (Sandra Oh) and Villanelle meet again via fish tank. Photo: BBC

Meanwhile, Eve copies every other TV investigation (like Inventing Anna recently) by sticking maps and names and photos to a wall. She connects all the significant dots relating to The Twelve, the series’ clandestine network of international assassins, of which the elusive Hélène (Call My Agent’s Camille Cottin) is a part. Eve’s intent on bringing them down.


Her former boss Carolyn is now a cultural attaché in Mallorca, but offers Eve help in her plight. Returning to the role, Fiona Shaw is a stern, elitist dream. She is, and has been, a consistently commendable aspect of the show (one of a few), and often steals the stage from both central performances.


As the start to the final season, episode one is pretty textbook and predictable. Villanelle’s duplicity and psychopathy no longer wield the same twist-value they once did, but Neal keeps it interesting: closing on an image that nobody will foresee. Neal keeps the tone, the atmosphere, and the comedy intact: providing many doses of colourfully coordinated nonsense.


At one point, Carolyn existentially quotes TS Eliot saying, ‘Humanity cannot bear very much reality,' and that summarises what Killing Eve is for. With its bizarre plotlines and lush locations, this is a show that revels in life outside the real world.


Killing Eve, season 4, comes to BBC iPlayer on Monday 28 February.



What Killing Eve, season 4 episode 1, BBC One review
When 28 Feb 22 – 28 Feb 23, ON BBC iPLAYER
Price £n/a
Website Click here for more information



Most popular

Things to do in London this weekend: 24–26 March. Photo: The Parakeet, Kentish Town
Things to do in London this weekend: 24–26 March
Irene Maiorino and Alba Rohrwacher in My Brilliant Friend season 4, HBO/Sky Atlantic (Photo: HBO)
My Brilliant Friend, season 4, Sky Atlantic: first-look photo, release date, plot, cast
Best art exhibitions in London. Photo: Thin Air at the Beams
Top exhibitions on now in London

Editor's Picks

Oliva Colman, Fionn Whitehead and Shalom Brune-Franklin in Great Expectations, BBC One (Photo: BBC/FX Networks/Pari Dukovic)
What to watch on TV this week
Cillian Murphy in Peaky Blinders season 6, BBC One (Photo: BBC)
Peaky Blinders, season 6, BBC One, first-look review
Sasha Lane and Alison Oliver in Conversations With Friends, BBC Three (Photo: BBC)
Conversations With Friends, BBC Three review
Julia Garner in Inventing Anna, Netflix (Photo: Netflix)
Inventing Anna, Netflix review
Ben Whishaw in This is Going to Hurt, BBC One (Photo: BBC)
This Is Going to Hurt, BBC One review
Lily James and Sebastian Stan in Pam & Tommy, Disney+ (Photo: Disney)
Pam & Tommy, Disney+, first-look review
Sign up to CW’s newsletter
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
2

Killing Eve

Jodie Comer

Sandra Oh

Fiona Shaw

BBC

TV

2022

You might like

  • Jodie Comer in Killing Eve season 3, BBC iPlayer

    Killing Eve season 3 finale, spoiler-free review, BBC ★★★★★

  • Jodie Comer in Killing Eve season 3, BBC iPlayer

    Killing Eve season 3 episode 1, BBC review (spoiler free) ★★★★★

  • Florence Pugh in The Wonder, Netflix (Photo: Netflix)

    The Wonder, Netflix: everything we know

  • Margherita Mazzucco as Elena Greco in My Brilliant Friend, Sky Atlantic (Photo: Sky)

    My Brilliant Friend, season 3 episode 1, Sky Atlantic review ★★★★★

  • Martin Freeman in The Responder, BBC One (Photo: BBC)

    The Responder, BBC One review ★★★★★



  • The Culture Whisper team
  • Support Us
  • Tickets
  • Contact us
  • Press
  • FAQ
  • Privacy
  • Terms and conditions
  • Cookies
  • Discover
  • Venues
  • Restaurants
  • Stations
  • Boroughs
Sign up to CW’s newsletter
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
×