Chatter Box Film

Crookhaven is based on the books and the series is set in the UK and follows a boy named Gabriel (Lucas Leach) who has grown up as a thief. One day he is recruited to attend Crookhaven, a secret school that trains young criminals with exceptional skills. There he meets Penelope, (Carmel Laniado); the headteacher’s daughter, who is determined to be the best at everything in order to make her father proud. Because of her competitive nature, she and Gabriel clash at first, but they soon realise they must learn to work together.

Along the way, Gabriel forms a group of friends: two brothers who are expert hackers and a girl who is talented at lock-picking. Together they must survive the challenges of the school, deal with rival students and bullies, and stay safe from a dangerous organisation known as the Nameless.  As the story progresses, a quiet romantic tension begins to develop between Gabriel and Penelope. At the same time, Gabriel is determined to uncover the truth about his parents and where he really comes from. Meanwhile, Penelope can’t stop thinking about her mother, who has been away on a mysterious mission for a long time without making any contact.

Crookhaven is a great TV program that really immerses you into this new world and show. Each episode felt like a level of a game with different tasks or missions to complete all while exploring this new world and school. All the cast were fantastic but Lucas Leach and Carmel Laniado had an amazing chemistry with each other as there was so much tension in their interactions. Gabriel was rather cool and badass  but could be slightly cold to his friends  especially at the start of the program. Penelope was also badass but I thought she would get angry and be short-tempered more easily but I think this is due to the pressure everyone expects from her to live up to her dad. I also thought Penelope enjoyed subtly getting under Gabriel’s skin and liked messing with and toying with him just to see him get annoyed. We are also introduced to two brothers and a girl who is great at picking locks who become Gabriel’s best friends and they bring out the comedy to the series, as Gabriel and Penelope are more serious characters. I was also shocked by the number of twists and turns throughout the show. For example, people you think are bad are actually good or just jealous but don’t mean actual harm and people you think are good are actually bad. There were two shocking twists with two characters who you do not expect to turn out to be villains, so I was extremely surprised, and this is another thing that helped make Crookhaven great. I often preferred more the mystery and action side of exploring the school and drama rather than the school lesson tasks and missions. I thought some of the school uniform outfits and shoes were good and everyone would wear not all the same things for example girls would wear different shoes to each other while some boys would wear jewellery or have different styles of school uniform some with jackets or jumpers and others with shorts or trousers. This was a clever touch as it gave each character their own unique style despite all the outfits looking the same if you pay attention you will notice lots of differences and uniqueness and thought this matched the theme of the program with disguises. 

Crookhaven is an extremely good program but there are a few things I wish would be improved for example we know the nameless are a bad organisation/gang criminals but they never really explain much about what they actually do they just tell us they are bad but without giving details about things they have done much of in the past, so I wish it would explore that more. I also would have liked a few more fight scenes, while there are some I would have liked a few more. Throughout the show, there are so many moments when it teases or hints at certain characters getting close to kissing but never do so I wish they did kiss.

Overall, Crookhaven is a fantastic new teen TV series, featuring an outstanding young cast who bring energy, tension, and depth to their roles. I really enjoyed the twists and mystery woven throughout the show, along with some good action. I highly recommend watching.