Episode 030: It’s a Sin
“The series follows a group of gay men who move to London in 1981. They form a friendship group but the fast developing HIV/AIDS crisis in the United Kingdom impacts their lives. Over five episodes the group are shown living through an entire decade until 1991, as they become determined to live fiercely despite the threat HIV poses to them.”
This week we are reviewing “It’s a Sin”, a British drama miniseries that takes place in London between 1981 and 1991, following the lives of several gay men and their friends while they live through the HIV & AIDS crisis in the UK. It's been a while since we watched a TV show, and as the issue of HIV/AIDs is a close cause to the Sisters, how could we not look at this!
You can either listen to the podcast above, or you can read below for a majority of the transcript of the podcast! Now as always, our discussion will begin with a brief summary of the show followed by spoiler free thoughts and feelings. This will be followed by an in-depth discussion of some of the key plot points that occurred and we will then finish off with my overall rating of the tv show and a heads up about what we are looking at next time. If you have not had a chance to watch It’s a Sin and don’t want to hear any spoilers, then please feel free to skip the detailed section and listen to it afterwards if you so wish.
The miniseries was written by Russell T Davies, a name we will most certainly see on this show again, and was directed by Peter Hoar while being produced by Red Production Company and premiered in the UK in January 2021. Thankfully they finished filming just before COVID hit the UK, meaning that we just avoiding the issue of two health pandemics being discussed in this episode!
The show depicts a part of important queer history, the HIV/AIDs pandemic from the 1980’s to 1990s and specifically focuses on a core group of characters in London, UK. The show starts off easy, introducing us to our core characters and them finding each other in London and slowly starts to show the escalation of the AIDs crisis, from it being merely rumours in America all the way to it claiming lives from both outside and inside the friend group. The main crux of the show actually comes from the lived experiences of Jill Nalder who is an activist who was heavily involved during the pandemic in helping the community, and she even makes an appearance in the show as Jill’s mother!
Sadly the subject matter of the show wasn’t one most mainstream providers wanted to take up, even though it's the 21st Century! So a nice nod of shame to BBC One and ITV who passed on this and a shady side eye to Channel 4, who although they did commission this, only did so after passing on it once before.
As a show tightly focused on a group of friends, one of the key strengths of the show is the acting of all involved. The characters presented are real people, who have their own strengths & faults, their own loveable traits as well as their eye-rolling opinions on certain things, and this is all brilliantly delivered by everyone in the show. It really helps the viewer connect with our characters and really brings a human element to a piece of history, and makes the drama that much more hard-hitting when things go wrong for our collection of friends.
In terms of representation the cast has a number of openly queer performers, from Olly Alexander to Neil Patrick Harris to Stephen Fry to Nathaniel Hall who is himself HIV-positive. This was an intentional choice as Davies wanted to create a safe space where queer actors could come in and be themselves, and it helps add authenticity to the story being told that it is fully owned by the queer community.
The show had a positive impact on those watching it, with the Terrence Higgins Trust reporting an upsurge in testing for HIV, with a new record of 8,200 testing kits being ordered in one day. They also had a special t-shirt created which helped fundraise 100,000 GBP for their work. And Olly Alexander’s band Years & Years, more of them in a future episode, also released a cover version of “It’s a Sin” by the Pet Shop Boys to help raise funds for George House Trust. It’s a great sign of how we can use media to positively influence and educate people, and it’s important even in this day and age to make sure we know our HIV status. It’s not the death sentence that it once was, but HIV & AIDS can still severely impact people's lives.
Final Feelings and Recommendation
Now for recommending this, I would say everyone should watch this to really understand the tragedy of the HIV/AIDs crisis that devastated our community. This is an important part of our shared history, and although it only covers a handful of the stories we could hear about from that period of time, it provides a powerful human story anyone should be able to appreciate.
For a rating, I couldn’t give this anything less than a 10 out of 10 red ribbons. It’s an emotional and powerful piece of media lending a humanising element to a tragic part of queer history.
SPOILERS AHEAD
Now, just a reminder that at this point, I will be going into a more detailed analysis of the show which means there will be spoilers! If you haven’t managed to watch It’s a Sin yet and you don’t want anything spoiled, then this is your last chance to avoid the discussion. Or you can go ahead and close the page, go watch the show and then come back afterwards to finish reading. I promise I won’t mind. Still here? Well then, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
For episode 1 we head back to 1981 and we get to meet each of the characters before they become friends. Ritchie is moving from the Isle of Skye to live in London and go to university with a family assuming he is very straight as he has stayed closested from them. Roscoe works on a building site and lives at home with a very religious family praying god takes the sodomy out of him, and forces him to run away from home before they take him to Nigeria where he would have been beaten for such things. And we have Colin, a Welsh lad moving to the city and renting a room from a family while he works at a suit shop with a perverted boss who clearly preys on the young boys by demanding they wash with him.
At university we then also meet Ash and Jill who are studying drama, with Jill confirming Ash is gay and she is willing to introduce him to Ritchie since he is checking him out. It’s a bit of a mortifying first time together, remember kids hygiene is important when planning to get down and dirty, and so Jill starts what seems to be a lifetime role of comforting Ritchie when things go tits up. But Ritchie comes into his own at New Years and we get a sexy montage of all the boys and he even has Ash join him for a night of fun eventually!
We get to see a really supportive friendship strike up between Colin and his co-worker Mr Coltrane when he rescues him from the lecherous boss, and it's great to see queer people supporting each other, especially the younger generation as they are still finding themselves. Yet he soon stops coming to work, being said to be off sick and after repeated attempts to try and see him at home, a neighbour lets Colin know he was taken to hospital.
It’s here we start to get the sense that things are going to continue getting darker, as he is on a locked ward and Colin has to wear a full suite of PPE. While Mr Coltrane just thinks it's bad luck that he and his husband got ill around the same time, we as an audience know where this is leading. And so we start the heartbreak of the show as we see genuine and lovely people catching a disease that is going to be their death sentence.
As Colin heads to the pub, he runs into Roscoe who gives him a drink to cheer him up and eventually heads with the gang to The Pink Palace for a house party! We have it mentioned again about a disease in San Francisco and how it seems to be affecting gay people and even heading this way, but skillfully placed so it’s not your main concern this night much like it wasn’t for our characters. However Colin hears of a spare room going and does agree to join the gang in living in The Pink Palace (all for 20 fucking quid a month as well!)
We get a lovely scene of domestic queer life with our gang going through their morning routines for starting the day which just warms my heart, yes to more domestic queer life supporting one another! And we then see Colin, Ritchie, and Roscoe all sharing their dreams for the future with people during interviews, high hopes for the future and so much life to live. Yet this is harshly juxtaposed with the death of Mr Coltrane with nurses being careful to wash everything down and have him in a secure casket before moving about. It’s such a haunting way to foreshadow things to come and to emphasis the tragedy to come where all this hope and life will be cut short for some.
As we move to episode 2, we head to 1983 where we have Jill and Ritchie performing at the pub, needing to do a certain amount before they can join their union. His parents stay under the false assumption they are a couple even though they repeatedly deny it, and Ritchie’s sister seems to hint that she has an idea of her brother's sexuality. Ritchie hooks up with a boy under the pier but once he mentions being from London it all goes cold, with him advocating it’s American boys you can’t sleep with, not London boys. If only that had been the case, but sadly diseases spread, especially when mainstream society doesn’t seem to give a fuck about it.
Moving into 1984, we have the gang talking about AIDs and Ritchie disappoints us all by going on an AIDs denialism rant about how weird it all sounds and it’s not true because he isn’t stupid, and he doesn’t believe it, so it must be false. Ah the surety the youth have on their understanding of the world. So frustrating to hear why it would have been difficult for some to accept as a real thing, especially when it wasn’t even a focus in the mainstream media at all since it only affected “the gays”.
Now they all have a friend in Gloria, who doesn’t show up for a house party and eventually calls Jill to come round and help him with some shopping. It’s all a bit cloak and dagger with the secrecy and urging not to get too close, and we can clearly guess what Gloria has wrong with them, even if our characters aren’t sure yet. He explains about the dehumanising questionnaire he had to complete and his belief that it couldn’t be that bad as they let him self-discharge and he just needs time to shake it off.
Jill is a saint and helps him out with the shopping and cleaning and just visiting him, and it does have an effect on her mental health but fuck does she try. She even goes to the doctor to try and get info but is cruelly brushed off as why would a doctor possibly carry information about HIV/AIDs nor could it ever affect a woman. Fucking hell the sheer incompetence and misinformation from medical professionals back then!
Colin is off to New York and so she asks him to find any books he can while there as boys are dying and it's happening in silence and she can’t find anything. Absolutely chilling. Thankfully he does find some material and brings it back, however it does result in him being dismissed by his work under the pretence of his apprenticeship finishing after his boss spots the books. Ah so it’s okay to cheat on your wife and sexually harass young men, but convictions come out when you think they are unclean eh. Utter prick!
Jill goes by Gloria’s one day and two randoms are in and act like utter cunts to her and tell her to leave the keys, he is coming back home with them to Glasgow. He doesn’t seem to want to leave but how can she fight family, and so Gloria is taken away. Jill comes home shattered, but the boys are all excited and won’t let her go to bed yet because her and Ritchie’s letters have come through confirming they are members of equity now! It’s all a bit much, and she breaks down crying and lets the gang know that Gloria is going back to Glasgow, but still keeps the weight of his secret.
Around the table as they all chat she mentions about them maybe stopping and thinking for a bit before sleeping around, and Ritchie quickly jumps on her for letting the thought police get to her. Thankfully she claps back that he is too clever by half and points out how easily things can spread, so hopefully he takes this message to heart and starts listening to others.
Jill sends Gloria a xmas card to try and stay in touch, he is a close friend after all. Sadly we see it delivered and thrown onto a bonfire in the family backyard as they burn all traces of their son from their lives, even his baby photos, as they can’t possibly have the reminder of a child who died of AIDs. Like WTF, how can you be so cold about your own child. And it ends with the song Gloria playing on the credits, a fitting tribute to someone full of life lost too soon.
In episode 3 we are in 1986. We see Jill is balancing her life in acting while also working on the crisis support phone lines, and Roscoe has apparently landed himself with a very well-to-do person who works in parliament on his latest one night stand adventure. We also follow Ritchie doing the casting call rounds, where he keeps running into Donald, who eventually finds himself at the gay bar and the two end up getting intimate before becoming a sickly sweet couple. The night Donald makes his screen debut, they decide to properly have sex and although they try using a condom, they complain they can’t feel anything etc and both agree to go bareback, using the false belief that “I think I’m clean” and “You can trust me”.
Colin’s new job finds him fallen over at work one morning after having a fit, and it’s strange since he has no history of epilepsy in the family. Even after going home, he doesn’t seem to improve and starts having phantom conversations before he is put into a locked ward. They break the news to his mum that he has AIDs and that a court order has been granted to detain him since he is a ‘public menace’ now he is dangerous in the eyes of the law. Urgh the sheer rank homophobia and lack of person centred care from either the medics or police. Not to mention the horrible fuckers living near his mum who start posting turds through her letterbox cause of their ignorance and hatred in their hearts!
Understandably the gang are all shocked and it does lead to some different reactions finding out AIDs has affected their bubble. Roscoe panics since they shared a room and is busy wrapping everything in black bags and ends up crying that night while Ritchie is busy checking all over his body as if it's going to be something easily spotted, before phoning his mum just to talk even though he pretends nothing is wrong and he even ghosts Donald.
Thankfully Jill and Ash have found a way to get a lawyer to help their case, and boy does she tear these idiots a new arsehole! They take the chance she gives them, and Colin gets to go back to London where they will be round the corner. It’s such a heart-wrenching moment where the gravity of the situation hits us as he apologises to his mum and states “I don’t want to die”. Fuck.
The rest of the boys all go out and get tested and although we see Ash and Roscoe getting the all clear, we see that Ritchie is too ashamed or scared to know, and so he actually just leaves. Urgh no, the key thing is to know your status, even if it is scary because how else do you protect yourself and others if you don’t know before having sex with someone.
Although on Ritchie hearing news, he does find out he got a part he auditioned for after Donald turned it down to go home. Ritchie’s agent comments on a lot of boys going home these days and never being seen again, and she asks him to promise that he won’t go home. I can only imagine the spectre of despair that hung around back then as people noticed everyone leaving and wondering if you would ever see them again and also who might be next. It’s just really heavy stuff.
During the scenes at the hospital, Jill helps educate Ritchie about how AIDs ruins the immune system and that is why coughs and colds can kill, and we also hear about the discrimination of the funeral home claiming its not safe to handle Colin’s body and his cremation would need to be at the end of the day to avoid contaminating others. The sheer inhumanity people were being treated with is just sickening.
While Jill and Ash leave, another woman comes in and we follow her, seeing that it is the woman that was renting the room to Colin when he first came over. It seems her son is also dying of AIDs, even if she won’t believe it because her son is ‘normal’, and we get the flashback here to show that this is how Colin caught the disease. It’s a subdued night at The Pink Palace when people go to bed and the call comes in the wee hours that Colin has gone. It’s such a fucking shame that someone who has had one single sexual partner is dying and that there he had the whole of his life ahead of him! It’s really such a cruel way that HIV/AIDs ripped through the community.
For episode 4 we move forward to March 1988. And talk about a cold open, we get the infamous tombstone advert warning people about AIDs, seeing the two spectrums of how this was taken by seeing two groups watch this at the same time, our Pink Palace gang and Ritchie's parents. It really shows that while this pandemic was a terrifying event for the queer community, there was a huge section of society who saw it as not their problem and we're happy to tune it out to watch game shows instead. Such a chilling juxtaposition which we know plays out everyday with tragic events being ignored by those it doesn't affect.
There is a funeral of someone the group knew, and two people get up and call out the fact that the person's boyfriend of 6 years has been banned and had everything taken from him. The fact families were so cold to change the locks on people and dismiss partners is just vile and although Ritchie points out the family is grieving, it's no excuse!
And the irony is Ritchie might be facing the same issue as we witness him trying everything to stay healthy, even taking part in some misinformation that went around that could have also been deadly, such as trying battery acid to get rid of AIDs. But the one thing he keeps ignoring is the helpline's advice of getting tested to know his status!
Now it wouldn't be a Thatcher time frame unless we mentioned the disgusting Section 28 and its restriction of mentioning anything queer in school settings, and we have this delivered by Ash retelling us about his new job. As a teacher he had to look through the school library and flag any materials that might be “dangerous” to the kids. We get a really impassioned speech about how silly this is and that there is nothing dangerous in the books, however we do get a quick slap to reality where as much as this is the right thing to say, if he wants to be employed he has to obey and instead did have to submit 2-3 books which did have, shock horror, queer people in them!
Now Davies does have us join Ritchie on the set of a Dr Who episode, which is actually a tribute to Dursley McLinden who was a mutual friend to Davies and Jill Nalder who died of AIDs, and it’s not just a shameless reference to Davies TV works. It is here that the makeup artist mentions to Ritchie that there is something wrong with his skin. This finally gets through to the boy and he goes and gets tested under a fake name, and is confirmed to have AIDs.
Now like many people having a hard time, Ritchie decides to surprise visit back home to see his family. And right away his mum is asking if something is wrong since it's unusual for him to show up unannounced to cook dinner. He plates up, but then can’t deal with it and actually walks out instead, causing an argument with his dad who just wants him there for even 20 minutes for his mothers sake.
Ritchie has a run in with Martin, an old school friend, at the pub, and they eventually head down to the beach for a drink and smoke. Ritchie overshares about fancying him in school and eventually ruins the night, Martin asking if Ritchie is alright to which he honestly answers no. He breaks down slightly as he comes to terms with the fact that he could have done anything and now he never will as we know what the end fate for him is, while Martin just seems to believe he will be too famous to come back home one day, not fully knowing about Ritchie’s status.
Jill and others are organising a protest for the 25th. Unfortunately Roscoe backs out as he has plans with his sugar daddy at some sort of expo and he won’t do this for Colin as all he did was behave in life and he still died, and Ritchie feels all people talk about now is AIDs and he just needs a break from it. So Ash, Jill, her parents, and others get ready for the day, although it is said that out of 600,000 gay men in the city they will be lucky to get 50 at the protest, and it really calls into question why there isn’t more mobilisation and outrage!
At the expo, Roscoe’s sugar daddy get’s a bit of a hard-on when Thatcher arrives, and when questioned how the fuck that is possible as a gay man, he retorts, and I quote “I’m not gay. Every so often, one has to shove their face in the shit to lift their head to smell the roses afterwards”. What an actual cunt! Thankfull Roscoe has the self worth to say fuck this and leaves to go join the protest with his found family, but not before making sure to piss in Thatchers coffee! Drink that ya cold bitch!
The protest kicks off with our activists blocking the road and holding up signs around a major pharmaceutical company for withholding drugs and price gouging people. Although some people are sympathetic, a lot of the people start yelling slurs and clapping when the police come in super heavy handed on everyone. I suppose ACAB goes back for decades! The pigs even smack Jill with a truncheon and at this moment who jumps in, quite literally onto the coppers back, but Ritchie, finally realising how self-centred he had been.
In the back of the police van, Ash tries to comfort Ritchie but he is told to stay back, and it is here, bleeding with his friends for standing up for queer people’s right to healthcare, that Ritchie breaks the news that he has AIDs. Such a surreal thing to do, but then he states that he is going to be the first to live, and it's so bittersweet because there is so much hope there but really we know how it will end.
In episode 5 we move to November 1991 after starting with a quick glimpse to November 1988 with Ritchie on stage for a standing ovation from his friends with even his family in the audience to witness his accomplishments. We see that Ritchie has been avoiding his family for a while, having Jill answer the phone to intercept and delay, and also sitting with him and just holding his hand to lend her support as he avoids going to see them for Christmas.
We see the amount of pills he is taking to stay on top of his health but tonight he falls out of bed with a temperature and ends up needing to go to hospital. The downstairs neighbour really puts her foot in it saying AIDs stands for Angels In Disguise and he will be preparing for eternal life and I totally salute Roscoe throwing the street bin through her window! What a stupid cow, who says that to people grieving the eventual loss of a loved one.
At the hospital Jill is talking to the nurses about the people who don’t have visitors and are dying in shame while Ash just lays with Ritchie and they both confess they love each other. And Roscoe runs into his father who is trying to console those dying and he even begs his son’s forgiveness after realising how wrong he has been after seeing the inhumane way people were treated back home. Honestly talk about multiple gut punches!
It turns out Ritchie has a lymphoma in his chest and he is determined to get the chemo to treat it, even against the doctors advice about how weak it will make him. It also leads to Ritchie wondering about how many he has killed, as he knew but kept having sex and couldn’t stop as there would be too much booze or sometimes not any. As he asks Jill if she hates him now, she just holds his hand, unwilling to be pushed away and let him isolate himself with all this shame.
And just when it couldn't be worse, who should come barging in but mum and dad demanding to know what's wrong after being sent here by the neighbour after trying to do a surprise visit. And like any fussing parents, they won't shut the fuck up and let Jill explain properly until Ritchie says he is gay and has AIDs.
Ritchie's parents handle this as well as you think they will, with dad determined to speak to a doctor as he will help his son scour this disease while his mother laughs, saying they are all very young and that it can't be AIDs as it's infectious and they let them come straight on in. It just keeps getting better as she then goes to hell at the nurse on reception for not phoning them as his parents, even though it's Ritchie's choice on who knows, and she takes a step out to take a deep breath before it's back in for another showdown.
Jill takes her to the kitchenette trying to explain she told him repeatedly to call and his mum is still under the delusion that he isn’t gay, boys are just terrible and will go for a rut every now and then but then they come to their senses. Another mother is in the kitchen and calls into question how she couldn’t know her child was gay, it's so obvious to everyone else so clearly she hasn’t been a very good mother. It sets his mom off but the other woman doesn’t give a fuck, and so Jill gets unfairly blamed for deceiving & standing in her way and called a bitch without her own life.
As Ritchie’s dad is crying in the TV lounge she storms in, demands he explains how this helps and dismisses his claims about no cure as being all the same rubbish they say. She then goes to visit her son and warns everyone to stay out and asks if he is infectious to which he confirms its transferred via fluids during sex and so she finally lets some other emotion than rage out and cries and kisses his forehead and tries to comfort him. As he keeps saying sorry she just confirms that he is now going to be another boy who went home, like so many before…
Back at Ritchie's family home, Jill tries calling but is told by his mother that he is fast asleep and that she best wait to visit since she had a lot of time with Ritchie while she didnt. Yet seconds later she is up the stairs, lying to Ritchie about Jill phoning saying she is busy with work and can't visit. Urgh, stop preventing his support network from seeing him, that helps no one!
Ritchie’s agent comes along to give Ash, Jill, and Roscoe the cash he is due and does explain the parents are acting illegally, but they will be hard-pressed to get anyway that route. Instead she advises them to get to the Isle of Wight, stay in a B&B, and lay siege until they get to see him to say goodbye, as sadly there is only one way this ends. A cold reminder that unfortunately, the clock is against them.
Roscoe and Jill initiate the plan, being just 20 minutes away and calling everyday, but to no avail. At some point Ritchie and his mum are talking and he makes it clear he doesn't want to be some kind of secret even though his mother is uncomfortable with this. He continues, letting his mum know that he had so much fun and he remembers each boy he has been with in some way and that “some of them were bastards but they were all great and that’s what people will forget, that there was so much fun”. It’s a reminder that behind this terrible part of history, there were real lives, of people enjoying themselves and expressing love so freely, and it all cruelly ended because of a single disease. He asks if she understands, to which she says no and this is why he needs to see Jill, he needs to see his support network that understands him and he just wants to see her.
We then cut to Jill and Ritchie's mum meeting at the beachfront. She admits to Jill she realises she hasn't handled this well and that Ritchie said he wanted to see her, so here she is. Jill, in my opinion wrongly, apologises for just turning up which mother just has to quip that it made things difficult for her. And before we can go and see Ritchie, his mother confirms that he died yesterday afternoon.
With this revelation, we have a really quiet moment of them both looking into the distance, interspersed with clips of the parents crying over their dead child. It's quite a simple but powerful moment to drive home the devestation people went through with this pandemic. Even worse is how cold Ritchie’s mum is, glibly saying it would have happened wherever he was and at least there was no pain, with his last words being asking for some water. Nor did she think to tell his closest friends last night since her son just died, so to her it wasn’t top of her list even though she had been blocking their access for weeks!
Jill asks if she was with him and finds out that he was alone since she was downstairs, and so powerfully says that this is his mothers fault. It all stems from how loveless she made his childhood home and why he grew up so ashamed, and this shame led him to kill others since he would have sex and then run away again and again. That this shame led him to believe that maybe he did deserve this disease and that thousands of men are out there thinking that they brought this on themselves right now, so yes, he died because of her! It is so heartbreaking to listen to, the fact that shame about who someone was could be such a powerful factor in so many people’s lives and it's a key reason why Sisters fight to banish this shame, because shame kills!
We watch as Jill and Roscoe comfort Ritchie's sister at the B&B and also phone Ash so he knows, witnessing the devastation each of them goes through. And we then have the wider circle come together for Xmas dinner where they share stories and remember each of the people they have lost over the decade. Because every person who became a statistic in this health crisis was a person with real impact on the people around them, and it's important to see the joy they brought to people’s lives as well as the pain left behind from them dying too soon.
We see Roscoe heading home to build bridges with his family and Jill going on to support other men who are all alone in the hospital to give them that vital human connection by just sitting and holding their hand in their final days. And to wrap the show we get a flashback to the gang in the park with Ritchie practising a soliloquy before a seagull steals his ice cream. It's such a bittersweet ending seeing the joy and carefree lives of Ash, Colin, Gloria, Jill, Roscoe, and Ritchie before HIV/AIDs hit and it's a stark reminder of all that potential and life to live being cut short. As if I hadn't cried enough yet this episode eh!