One Day: Love In Its Most Banal & Beautiful Form

The series doesn't try to say something, prove something, or make a point about love and relationships or people or society. <em>One Day</em> just is, almost like a picture book of Emma and Dexter’s lives.

Amitabh+Pande

Dec 18, 2024

Promo poster for One Day.

AFTER A WHILE and amidst the world’s continued obsession with crime and murder and war and historical epics, comes a breath of fresh air in a very watchable rom-not-quite-com limited edition series, based on David Nichol’s successful novel of the same name.

The series is a fourteen under-30-minute episode story told over two decades of the growing relationship between Dexter (played by Leo Woodall ) and Emma (Ambika Mod). Meeting in 1988 at their university graduation party in Edinburgh, when they almost get together, their lives go separate ways meandering through relationships, careers, jobs, and everything in between that happens in the lives of young Brits during the roaring 90s. And all this while, staying connected to each other mostly only as friends, even though there is clear chemistry between them that they both deny and even fight against. Eventually, as they get together, life seems to have other plans, because Emma and Dexter are destined to be forever together and forever apart at the same time.

The beauty of this series is in the ordinariness of the story. A little reminiscent of When Harry Met Sally in the idea of love spanning a long timeline, but minus the drama or the sparkle or even the romance. One Day, as the name suggests, is not larger than life, or a big love story. It’s an almost banal tale of two very British youngsters and their adulting years. It’s like a story of your friend or your friend’s friend that someone is narrating to you. And that actually is what works for the series. No hype, no jazz, no over-promise, no commitment to a happy ending or even an ending. The series is not trying to say something, prove something, or make a point about love and relationships or people or society. One Day just is, and we watch it like a picture book of Emma and Dexter’s lives.

Leo Woodall and Ambika Mod, the central characters, as quintessential opposites, deliver convincing performances. There are some moments of vulnerability when they are with each other, and when they are with other characters are beautifully done. There is also a no-fuss story-telling that’s easy to watch like a warm cup of English tea that you go back to every day before bedtime. Which makes it a good reason to watch.

However, the one big issue with the series is that episode after episode, it leaves you with a feeling of dissatisfaction. It’s like the series doesn’t want you to feel anything fully and is deliberately trying to leave you with incomplete and unresolved feelings. Be it Dex’s broken marriage, his pain on not being able to see his child grow, or seeing his mom die, or Emma’s breakup with a boyfriend that really loved him, or her relationship with her best friend’s baby, or her reluctant yearning for a baby herself… many more such feelings, just left of the table, for us to leave behind in every episode. One way to look at this is that it’s genius because this feeling of incompletion we are left with is exactly what Emma and Dexter are going through in the entire story, in their relationships, in their jobs, in their families, and even when they finally get together. And for us to be left with the same feeling, is brilliant.

But the other way to look at it is that as a piece of content, we want to feel like we’ve got good return for the time we’ve spent investing across many days. And at the end of all the episodes, we are left with so many unresolved emotions that we feel a bit exhausted and unfulfilled. Well, perhaps a little bit like life… is that the point?

All in all, a good easy watch if you’re in the mood for romance and a little light non-drama. But keep your expectations low on waiting for things to happen.

The writer has a blog, Viewing Room, with more of his thoughts on all things "books, booze, box office and other bakwaas". Click here to read.