I'd never heard of this series but was idly browsing Netflix when this came up. I thought "what the hell, l give it a shot." Since I had no expectations I wasn't pre-empting anything but was pleasantly surprised and well... enthralled with a series which grabbed my attention and kept the momentum going till the end of the season. There were a few bumps along the way, but on the whole it delivered a great entertainment piece I really enjoyed.

Of course we're probably well familiar with the Addams Family, their intricacies and dark existence, which for the most part has always been treated as a dark comedy genre. Its similar here but a little different. It's quirky, dark but a tad more open handed that prior renditions. Jenna Ortega - who I'd never heard of is exceptional as Wednesday, and when I saw Catherine Zeta-Jones in the opening credits of the first episode, I had to look twice to realise it was her playing Morticia Addams. Luis Guzman brings an unusual character rendition with Gomez, but a good one. In fact the whole cast is pretty accomplished and I loved Gwendoline Christies Principal Weens. Aside from the cast most things in the production are great. There is nothing that stands out as lacking though some things were problematic.

I found the dichotomy of Nevermore existing in the rhealms of fantasy but firmly placed in the space of the real world problematic.

The framework of awareness between the two worlds is not clearly defined as with say with shows like Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, or The Witcher, so I found myself unable to accept or relax into much of the story as it unfolded. I was never sure how characters and occurrences were defined within the story space. For example the sheriff's attitude (and indeed that of the whole town) suggest he's completely ignorant of supernatural issues, then he isn't so much... then he sort of is. Well which is it? It's an uncomfortable oversight that needs clarification and this is never done.

I'm liberal minded and forward thinking, but don't like the way modern social issues seem to be shoehorned into every production out of Hollywood. I don't want to be beaten over the head with social issues (even those I agree with) when I'm trying to escape in an alternate plane of visual entertainment. I cringed when I heard Wednesday use the term 'Mansplaining' and nearly called it term when 'gender neutral toilets' came up in the plot.

Joy Sunday who plays the black schoolgirl has thick luscious lips, but there is only one scene in the whole series (I suspect this was an oversight) where they don't look like they were coated with ultra mirror finish meant for the Hubble telescope. I'm not sure why this aspect of her persona had to be so severely accentuated, if it was shot in a strip joint them maybe, but in a school setting? It was totally ridiculous.

Wednesday is fifteen (her sixteenth birthday in episode six) but the sheriff's son Tyler who works in the coffee shop is trying from episode one to date her! Even though it's never stated just how old he is, the screenplay pits him in about mid twenties and its safe to say he seems and acts ten years older than Wednesday. This makes him a blatant podophile. Even seeing them before they became somewhat 'entangled' gave me an uneasy feeling and seeing them kiss was just weird and mind-bogglingly distasteful. Is it OK for a TV series to portray this as acceptable? I found difficult to deal with throughout the series. Did the produces think it was ok to have 25 year old man going after a 15 year old girl? Really?

Ok so those are my main gripes, which is not to say there weren't others but nothing worth mentioning that wouldn't make this too long. All in all I really liked this. I've given it a generous 7/10 as an unexpected find, but I did have a hard time with some of the issues I've outlined above.