"I'm infertile, let's get married. It's not good, is it?" - Jenny Gifford (Fay Ripley) critiquing her friends' engagement
Cold Feet: Complete 3rd Series DVD Review
By A.J. Carson
It's inevitable - like it or not, we all grow older by the day. Our hope is that we also grow wiser. The pals at the heart of Cold Feet have definitely grown older in the time that has passed between series two and series three. Whether they've grown wiser, however, is arguable. Bad news for the show's characters, but great news for fans of this superior Brit comedy drama.
Cold Feet's newest couple, Adam Williams (James Nesbitt) and Rachel Bradley (Helen Baxendale) are happily back together after working out the differences that popped up in series two. (And what differences they were, including secret abortions, younger boyfriends, and yet another girlfriend named Rachel.) They are so over-the-moon in love that they even discuss having a baby and getting married.in that order. They don't even know whether they can have a baby since Adam's radiotherapy treatments for testicular cancer in series two may have left him sterile.
Speaking of babies, Karen and David Marsden (Hermione Norris and Robert Bathurst) have just given birth to twin girls. They should be happy, but they aren't. Karen's boozy mum, Heather (Mel Martin), arrives to "help" with the twins but mostly helps herself to her son-in-law's liquor cabinet. Josh, their toddler son, reacts with The Omen-like malice to his new siblings. David gets involved with community activism, partially because of encouragement from a beautiful member of the community board. And Karen wonders what her life would have been like had she married a free spirit rather than boring, conservative David.
While Karen and David fantasize about life without each other, Jenny and Pete Gifford (Fay Ripley and John Thomson) are in the midst of a trial separation. Jenny unsuccessfully tires to reenter the workplace, her sardonic wit preventing her from holding any job longer than a week. She does manage to find a cute new boyfriend - dot com millionaire Richard (Coupling's Ben Miles). Pete, however, is desperately lonely. He has difficulties finding a place to live, joins a gay football team, surfs chat rooms, and even finds love in the most unlikely of places.
Many shows struggle to find new things for their characters to do as the years progress. Think of Friends. By that series' tenth and final year, its creators had moved the characters around like chess pieces. Every possible permutation of the Ross-Rachel-Joey triangle was played out ad nauseam. This back-and-forth didn't add anything to the characters - it was just a way to fill another weekly episode.
So far, however, the characters in Cold Feet have gotten richer and more complex with each series. This year, each of the couples is at a crossroads. Adam and Rachel's relationship is blossoming into a long-term commitment. They face the same kinds of roadblocks that popped up in the past, but rather than causing them to break up.again.these difficulties now reaffirm their commitment to one another. Pete and Jenny struggle with whether or not to officially end their commitment. They are still fond of each other, are unsure if that's enough to save their marriage. Each moves on to new mates, but something is missing in these new relationships. David and Karen both experience things in this series that greatly affect their future together.
All of these plot strands intertwine throughout the third series, building up to a heartbreaking finale. The bittersweet final episode is a perfect blend of beginnings, endings, and the discomfort that often goes hand-in-hand with friendship. And, as usual, it leaves us breathlessly waiting for Cold Feet's next series.
The eight episodes that make up series three are divided onto three discs. The discs are housed in three standard-sized keepcases which slide into a cardboard slipcover. The back of each keepcase includes brief synopses of the episodes found on the DVDs. The synopses sometimes give away plot points, so you may want to put off reading them until after you've seen the episodes.
The menus are simple and functional. A dance sequence from episode three plays in a continuous loop in a small window. Viewers can choose to watch an entire episode or can jump directly to a scene using the "Scene Selection" menu.
