Absolute Beginners (Absolutni Debiutanci): Season 1 – TV Review

TL;DR – This is a fairly predictable story about a love triangle, but an engaged cast and more female perspective help elevate the material.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Disclosure – I paid for the Netflix service that viewed this series.

Two hand meet.

Absolute Beginners Review

Earlier this year, we dipped our toes into Polish TV for the first time with the Sci-Fi/Romance romp called A Girl and an Astronaut. That was our gateway, but I wanted to spend more time in this world, and today’s review provided just such an occasion.

So to set the scene, we open on a sprint to Ustka, a resort town on the Polish Coastline. Here, Lena (Martyna Byczkowska) and Niko (Bartłomiej Deklewa) are making a mad dash to film around and catch up to a local train to help with their application to film school. Their mothers, Bogusia (Anna Krotoska) and Tamara (Katarzyna Warnke), have been friends since they were kids and now own a holiday home together where the families go each year. However, this year, both families are on the cusp of significant changes: moving to Italy, wondering if they are happy in their marriage, a wash of hormones affecting everything, which is a setting primed for danger even before Niko and Lena find Igor (Jan Sałasiński) alone struggling in the surf. Now from here, we will be looking at the season as a whole, so there will be [SPOILERS] ahead. 

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