My Review of Welcome To Chippendales: "Switzerland"

 

Written by Rajiv Joseph And Robert Siegel

Directed by Richard Shepard

Steve (to Ray): "Without me, there is no Chippendales."

These last few episodes really hammered home the downfall of Steve Banerjee and with this finale, the remaining part of his end came at the hand of someone whom Steve had placed too much trust in. Yup, it was Ray who brought about the end for Steve Banerjee.

With a large portion of the episode set in Switzerland (hence the title), there was a hell of a cat and mouse game between Steve and Ray. The former had become increasingly paranoid following his role in Nick's death and the latter was desperate to extract a confession from his employer in order to spare himself jail time.

For a moment it seemed like Steve was more annoyed with Ray's failed attempt to take out three dancers ripping off Steve at the London Chippendales before realising that he was being recorded. There was genuinely great acting from both Kumail Nanjiani and Robin de Jesus in those scenes as both ken had their respective worlds fall apart, but more specifically, Steve realised that he couldn't get away from his crimes any more.

The jail scene between Steve and a ghostly appearance from Nick though was a nice way of giving us one more scene with the latter character. Nick poked and prodded away all of Steve's insecurities and excuses before Steve in his own desperate  attempt to spare Irene being penniless ended up taking his own life before he could be charged. 

It was a tragic end to a story mired in so much jealousy, insecurity and corruption. While I don't think the series needed eight episodes (a lot of these type of miniseries biopics could tell these stories with six episodes and cut a lot of filler), the story of Steve Banerjee and his rise and fall with Chippendales did make for some interesting content.

- The afterlife ending with Steve back in the club with Irene and Nick (I don't think I saw Denise or Ray there) was a bit of a cheesy last scene.

- I can't tell if Ray had a crush on Steve because the level of devotion he had towards the latter, in spite of giving him up to the FBI was something else.

- Standout music: More, More, More as it played out during the closing credits.

- Chronology: Around 1992 with scenes in London, Lucerne and Los Angeles. 

Switzerland capped off this limited series in a reasonably good manner and while UK and Irish viewers can enjoy the series from January 11th on Disney+, it's over for me. Overall, while it could've told the story in less episodes and felt a little less showy compared to some of these other type of limited series, I did enjoy this a lot.

Rating: 7 out of 10