The Last Request
Episode 3 of After Life Season 3 starts with Tony honoring his dad’s last request. In a home video, we see him discussing death, and specifically how he wants his ashes to be scattered in Mid Lake after he dies. The destination in question is a pub called The Traveler’s Friend, a place where he actually proposed to Tony’s mum. Back in the present, we return to the Tambury Gazette where two obnoxious men running a podcast – Ratty and Nonce – show up and immediately start cursing and causing a ruckus. They want to promote their show, which allows “men to be men.” After this rather rude start to the day, Tony heads off to visit Ewen, a man who’s banned from the all-you-can-eat buffet in town. That’s a whole different situation, but the real meat and potatoes of the story is Tony heading off to scatter his dad’s ashes. Just prior to that though, there’s a really nice moment in the office where Kath, feeling down in the dumps following her reading, is invited out for a coffee with Tony. On the way, Kath runs into a lawyer called Charles, and the two seem to hit it off immediately. It’s especially nice because Tony actually gives some solid, honest advice for her too, urging her to just act herself around him. Unfortunately Kath does the exact opposite during her date. She lies and claims she’s a doctor. This only opens up more questions during their date, especially when someone starts choking at a table across the room. Meanwhile, James starts to regret his choice of moving in with Brian. Seeing life from the other side, with the place a mess and boxes stacked up to the ceiling (not to mention Brian using the toilet while he’s having a bath) sees James contemplate his life choices. In Mid Lake, Tony gets to work scattering his dad’s ashes. They find the pub and scatter his ashes, but the bar owner immediately takes offence. He’s pretty rude and Tony eventually throws the ash right in his face. “I hope that was his c*ck” He says. (There is more but I won’t write that here!) As Matt and Tony leave, they reflect on what’s happened and laugh it off.
The Episode Review
The middle chapter of this series starts to slow things down, with the different subplots ticking by and revolving around the idea of moving on and making sense of one’s life. This actually works pretty well across the chapter and seeing James realize that life isn’t always greener on the other side of the fence is a great way of reinforcing that. Meanwhile, Kath’s lies go against Tony’s advice, and that’s likely to be her downfall. She’s almost certainly going to get called out for that and I wouldn’t be surprised if this trend continues until she hits a breakthrough. With the character relationships continuing to develop, it’ll be interesting to see what direction the second half of this season takes.
