Arriving three years after Season 2, Good Omens 3 is a done-in-one wrap-up of this strange and wonderful story, based on the novel by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. Having foiled the Apocalypse and untangled the mystery of an amnesiac archangel, angel Aziraphale (Michael Sheen) and demon Crowley (David Tennant) must work together to prevent the end of everything amid the Second Coming.
SPOILER WARNING: IF YOU HAVEN’T WATCHED GOOD OMENS S3 ALREADY,
STOP HERE AND WATCH, THEN COME BACK.
When we left our odd duo, Aziraphale had been welcomed back to Heaven, promoted to a new role and… leaving his friend Crowley behind. Crowley had made an impassioned plea for him to stay, saying that it had always been the two of them against Heaven and Hell but now Aziraphale was abandoning him. And thus they parted ways. Once in Heaven, the Metatron (aka the Voice of God, played by Derek Jacobi) told him the new project was called The Second Coming. (Cue ominous music.)
Years later, Crowley is sleeping in an alleyway near Aziraphale’s abandoned bookshop. He begs money from Mrs. Sandwich (Donna Preston)—the last original resident/business owner on Whickber Street—and plays rigged games of chance to win back his lost Bentley. Aziraphale is trying his best to keep things working in Heaven, but the archangels under his nominal leadership—Michael (Doon Mackichan), Uriel (Gloria Obianyo), and Sandalphon (Paul Chahidi)—are restless and eager to begin the End Times. When Jesus (Bilal Hasna) is reincarnated as a young innocent who vaguely remembers being nailed up somewhere, the angels argue over whether his return will cause a bloodbath or a spiritual reawakening.
When the Metatron goes missing, the kid uses the hubbub to escape Heaven, taking the elevator down to Soho in London to find Crowley (whom he met some time ago). He makes his way to the alley, where the drunk demon mutters about the game he lost (three card monte); he tells Jesus (who goes by Josh) to “find the lady” but doesn’t explain what that means.
Aziraphale goes to Earth to seek Crowley’s help in finding Jesus and getting the Second Coming back on (a more pacifistic) track. It turns out Whickber Street, his old home, is being torn apart for new construction; only the (closed) bookshop and Mrs. Sandwich’s business survive. Crowley, bitter and angry, refuses to help until Aziraphale promises to help get his car back.
Back at the bookshop, Aziraphale is astonished that the place has remained untouched. Crowley grudgingly admits that he kept the place safe, using the remnants of his demonic powers and sacrificing his car along the way. Aziraphale is touched but troubled that Crowley proved to be a much better friend than he was.
Getting the car back leads to a confrontation with Brian Cameron (Sean Pertwee), a local crime boss whose daughter Misty (Poppy Lee Friar) is about as violence-minded as he is. Aziraphale suggests a game: competitive crosswords! And he wins, though it takes a minor miracle to extract them from Cameron’s workplace.
Josh, meantime, pursues his quest to “find the lady.” This brings him to Harry the Fish (Mark Addy), an old hustler who introduces him to three card monte. Josh sees the dextrous manipulation of the cards as a metaphor for navigating through life and trying to find one’s path. He begins to preach this new gospel, handing out limitless pizza and engaging a small but growing crowd.
It turns out that Jesus isn’t the only thing Aziraphale has lost. The Book of Life has gone missing. Crowley and Aziraphale go to Heaven to chase the missing book, but camera footage shows a blink and the book vanishes. Muriel (Quelin Sepulveda), a lower-order angel who’s long on enthusiasm but low on experience, is tasked by Michael to investigate.
Aziraphale and Crowley deduce that the Book itself has rewritten reality. It’s possible it’s in the hands of demons. Crowley says he can’t go to Hell, as they already know him too well, so Aziraphale disguises himself as a senior demon and goes Downstairs. All he finds is that Hell doesn’t have the book, only a few tidbits of information passed by an informant Upstairs.
Well, if it’s not in Hell… the two deduce the culprit about the same time as Muriel and Saraqael (Liz Carr), though it’s too late to help Uriel. She’s been erased by Michael, who is tearing out and burning up pages from the Book of Life. They take Crowley’s car to the Eternal Flame at the center of the universe, but it’s much too late; most of the Earth has been burned out of existence.
Aziraphale understands the horrible burden Michael has endured and has pity, forgiving her for what she’s done. Guilt-stricken, she burns up her own page and ends the universe. Crowley saves one page—the bookshop—and they retreat there… even as the last of the book burns, so that the shop is now all of Creation.
Really. The bookshop, one angel and one demon are all that exist. Well, until Satan (Toby Jones) shows up. They debate what’s going to happen now, until Crowley and Aziraphale take a book (they’re all blank, now that literature has been burned away) and begin to write in it. Is it the new Book of Life? “It is if we want it to be,” Crowley declares, and they write that there are four of them in the shop—because they want to ask God (Tanya Moodie) a few questions. Satan grumbles that it’ll be the Problem of Evil again and… sort of, but more like “why create humans if all you’ll do is judge them for being human?”
God then gives them the authority to make one decision: what should happen now?
They discuss it. Aziraphale tells Crowley that he, a demon, was always an artist and a believer in humanity’s potential. Inspired, they tell God what they want: a new universe, but one without angels, demons, or God. God is intrigued… and grants their wish. The bookshop implodes and the universe is reborn and nearly 14 billion years later, in London, a bookshop manager is asked by a singular customer if he has books on astrophysics…
Good Omens came to this close through a troubled route, which I won’t explore in any depth except to say it nearly didn’t happen. The story of an angel and a demon, making their way on Earth since the dawn of Creation, comes to this point, where the universe must change or the End Times’ shadow will always loom over mankind. It’s a remarkably secular message, that humanity must look to itself for salvation, not appeal to or rely upon unknowable and uncommunicative forces from beyond. It’s a timely message.
Michael Sheen and David Tennant are, once again, the beating heart of this uncanny romance. The shadings of emotion that flow between them—from silly affection to bitter disappointment to baffled misunderstanding—reflect a deep connection that gives the story its emotional grounding. If they weren’t as in tune as they are, the whole enterprise might not work at all.
Sadly, this chapter of the story has only scattered callbacks to earlier seasons. Donna Preston as Mrs. Sandwich is the only remaining character from Whickber Street, and there are no guest appearances from prominent supporting characters who aren’t angels or demons. Doon Mackichan is properly cold and arrogant as Michael, until she breaks down from the strain of using the Book; she believes she is best suited to run the universe, even if her attempts only lead to destruction. (Another timely theme.) It’s a good performance, clearing the board so that something better might be made.
Jones and Moodie are both wonderfully effective as Satan (“it’s a job title, it’s not my name”) and God, offering a yin and yang that informs why the final decision is what it should be.
What had been a cosmic epic reduces, at the end, to the story of two singular fellows. It is sweet, that closing scene, and entirely appropriate. One only wonders what might have been, if fate had allowed the show to close out with six episodes as originally intended.
Rating: B
Level of Enthusiasm: 80%
