Episodes one to eight of this series were amongst the best thing on Netflix in the last 12 months. It's such a shame that the final episode for me drove a stake through the heart of some of the content that went before it. Personally the actions of Orestis from the death of Charalampos onwards seem to me to make no real sense and his disappearing act on Klelia in particular seems bizarre and cruel. The killing of Charalampos was in large part in self defence and disposing of his body just aggravates and complicates the whole situation. In this regard Orestis seems to go from an intelligent guy to a moron in an instant. Despite this I can't forget the excellent content throughout the rest of this production. The cast is universally superb. Personally Haris Alexiou steals the show for me as the force of nature grandmother of Klelia and Antonis and The Prayer (Ep 3), which is built around her backstory, is a beautiful piece of television. Closely behind her is Klelia Andriolatou who gives a totally convincing and irresistible performance as her namesake character. None of this would have worked as well without the viewer being so invested in Klelia's personal story. There isn't a weak link amongst the whole central cast however and having a number of different characters narrating different episodes works really well. One such narrator is Maria Kavoyianni who gives a moving performance as the wife of Charalampos. She conveys incredible courage and decency that shines in stark contrast to his vile exploits. I didn't realise until well into this series that Christophoros Papakaliatis who plays Orestis also created this whole story which is an incredible achievement. The last episode didn't quite do it for me but overall this is an exceptional tv series, with beautifully written characters brought to life by a fabulous cast, gorgeously filmed and accompanied by a great soundtrack made up of classical, Greek music, an occasional 1960's number and a modern cover or two. Ultimately my disappointment at the conclusion only exists because the rest of the series got me to invest so much into the piece. Ultimately it is a fine production well worth the investment of the viewers time.
