This is one of the best TV series I have ever watched and this is one of the best written episodes. The story is excellent. I don't write many reviews, but this episode was so good I felt compelled to voice my opinion. I looked up the location and it has become a tourist attraction because of the success of this show. I'm not sure if I want to visit and potentially spoil my imagination and allure. This fictional place makes me happy and the reality I would experience visiting there could ruin it for me. I am rambling on so that I fulfill the ten line requirement set by this website. I hope my review inspires someone to watch this show.
7 Reviews
This should have been their Valentine's episode
tunix_20089 August 2018
I love this series because the actors look like real people and the characters are written so realistically. I particularly love Joan's story. This series shows that a true love story does not need characters who look like Ken and Barbie just real people with genuine emotion. And that scenery! It's a character in itself. It really broke my heart when Martin and Joan stood at the cliff watching John's yacht sail off in the distance. We didn't need to hear how Martin told his aunt the truth about John her reaction was enough. At that moment Joan was like Portwenn, seemingly strong and hardy, formidable and weather-battered but gentle and tender and beautiful.
Unrequited
Hitchcoc10 January 2018
This show is quite thematic in nature. This episode focuses in on how we, as human beings, seem stay inward, failing to take chances. Everyone is flitting around, not showing true feelings. The major plot element involves Martin's aunt, who is visited by a man who was a lover years ago. We find out quickly, he is ill and that sets certain factors in motion. Doc Martin relocates a fifteen year old's shoulder and she falls in love with him. She has true feelings, but, of course, he has none (other than fear of misunderstanding). Elaine, the most distasteful character in the series, decides to manipulate Al, who is intellectual and lonely. She has him jumping through hoops. She is such an ugly person (and I don't mean physically). So far, I can see no redeeming characteristics in her. When Martin tried to fire her in an early episode, the whole town turned against him. What does she offer to the town, other than a bunch of giggly teens who seem frightened of her. I can't imaging a medical office depending on the likes of her. This episode ends with an extremely touching scene and gives us more of a portrait of the aunt.
This is one of the best!
rogerwseward10 July 2017
If you haven't had the chance to watch this show, drop what you're doing and (well don't drop your phone or I pad or whatever it is you're using) check it out! This is one of the best episodes but I would say they all are! Great writing, wonderful scenery and you couldn't ask for a better variety of wonderful character actors. This show will make you feel happy and will draw you in from the very start.
three love stories
quinoble11 July 2023
Warning: Spoilers
This episode is all about love stories, one slightly comical, another cruel, and the third extremely moving.
First the comical one: a teenage patient develops a crush on Martin and he has to dissuade her from her increasingly blatant attempts to seduce him. The show takes her feelings seriously instead of treating her as a joke. It's easy for adults to dismiss teen crushes as "puppy love" but for them it's very real and the writers are respectful of that.
The second story isn't very enjoyable, it's about Al's abortive attempt to court Elaine, who's temporarily on the outs with her boyfriend. The introverted, sensitive Al is totally mismatched with the boorish, self-absorbed Elaine, who promptly drops him when she gets bored. Elaine is the most cartoonish character on the show and I can see why she was written off after S1. All the other villagers feel more well-rounded but she's just shallow and mean.
The last story is the best: Aunt Joan's old lover, John, returns to Portwenn after decades away, hoping to rekindle her interest. Martin immediately takes a dislike to him but eventually he comes to understand John after learning much about his aunt and his youth in Portwenn that he didn't know before. The story ends in a very bittersweet but satisfying way as Joan and Martin stand on the hills watching John sail away from Portwenn for the last time. We don't get a lot of romances between older adults and this one is perfectly done, mixing themes of lost love, age, second chances, and sacrifice as well as the ethical conflict Martin is placed in when his duty to patient confidentiality clashes with his loyalty to his beloved aunt.
Because of Joan's story I rank this episode higher than the season finale, which is very good but more melodramatic and contains the obligatory service to the Martin-and-Louisa endgame.
Joan's story really shows how good this show can be in the writing and acting. It's so simple but so moving and melancholy, it has a timeless feel that makes it really stand out.
First the comical one: a teenage patient develops a crush on Martin and he has to dissuade her from her increasingly blatant attempts to seduce him. The show takes her feelings seriously instead of treating her as a joke. It's easy for adults to dismiss teen crushes as "puppy love" but for them it's very real and the writers are respectful of that.
The second story isn't very enjoyable, it's about Al's abortive attempt to court Elaine, who's temporarily on the outs with her boyfriend. The introverted, sensitive Al is totally mismatched with the boorish, self-absorbed Elaine, who promptly drops him when she gets bored. Elaine is the most cartoonish character on the show and I can see why she was written off after S1. All the other villagers feel more well-rounded but she's just shallow and mean.
The last story is the best: Aunt Joan's old lover, John, returns to Portwenn after decades away, hoping to rekindle her interest. Martin immediately takes a dislike to him but eventually he comes to understand John after learning much about his aunt and his youth in Portwenn that he didn't know before. The story ends in a very bittersweet but satisfying way as Joan and Martin stand on the hills watching John sail away from Portwenn for the last time. We don't get a lot of romances between older adults and this one is perfectly done, mixing themes of lost love, age, second chances, and sacrifice as well as the ethical conflict Martin is placed in when his duty to patient confidentiality clashes with his loyalty to his beloved aunt.
Because of Joan's story I rank this episode higher than the season finale, which is very good but more melodramatic and contains the obligatory service to the Martin-and-Louisa endgame.
Joan's story really shows how good this show can be in the writing and acting. It's so simple but so moving and melancholy, it has a timeless feel that makes it really stand out.
When "Doc Martin" Becomes a Keeper
darryl-tahirali3 December 2023
Love is in the air in Portwenn, but ultimately it leaves a bittersweet fragrance. There was a moment early in the first season of "Northern Exposure," the American series with a similar premise as "Doc Martin," when the show locked into place and the viewer became invested in the characters for the long haul, and although the show might continue to sport comedic, even absurdist, flourishes, it had become a relationship drama---with the viewer involved in the relationships with the characters.
"Of All the Harbours in All the Towns" was such a moment for "Doc Martin," with a trio of threads (also a "Northern Exposure" specialty) that solidified the characters' presences, all the more notable because the script was co-written by Kirstie Falkous and John Regier, the series' story consultants whose deep knowledge of "Doc Martin" manages to make this episode endearing. Martin's Aunt Joan gets a big surprise when seafaring ex-lover John Slater (John Alderton) sails into Portwenn after 30 years. Turns out he remembers Martin as a boy, and there is no love lost between them, but John is keen to rekindle his affair with Joan---literally, as Joan was married when they were lovers.
Meanwhile, after getting on the outs with her boyfriend, Martin's receptionist Elaine picks up Al Large as her rebound, much to Al's overeager delight. And when Martin relocates Melanie Gibson's (Stephanie Leonidas) shoulder, the doe-eyed 15-year-old develops an increasingly steamy crush on him. But Martin's diagnosis of John, which forces him to contemplate his mortality, is the somber note to this carefree ballad. Both Martin and Joan gain deep dimension in an absorbing episode by turns amusing and moving, solidifying both the aloof, haughty lead and the sometimes-eccentric locals. "Of All the Harbours in All the Towns" is when "Doc Martin" becomes a keeper.
REVIEWER'S NOTE: What makes a review "helpful"? Every reader of course decides that for themselves. For me, a review is helpful if it explains why the reviewer liked or disliked the work or why they thought it was good or not good. Whether I agree with the reviewer's conclusion is irrelevant. "Helpful" reviews tell me how and why the reviewer came to their conclusion, not what that conclusion may be. Differences of opinion are inevitable. I don't need "confirmation bias" for my own conclusions. Do you?
"Of All the Harbours in All the Towns" was such a moment for "Doc Martin," with a trio of threads (also a "Northern Exposure" specialty) that solidified the characters' presences, all the more notable because the script was co-written by Kirstie Falkous and John Regier, the series' story consultants whose deep knowledge of "Doc Martin" manages to make this episode endearing. Martin's Aunt Joan gets a big surprise when seafaring ex-lover John Slater (John Alderton) sails into Portwenn after 30 years. Turns out he remembers Martin as a boy, and there is no love lost between them, but John is keen to rekindle his affair with Joan---literally, as Joan was married when they were lovers.
Meanwhile, after getting on the outs with her boyfriend, Martin's receptionist Elaine picks up Al Large as her rebound, much to Al's overeager delight. And when Martin relocates Melanie Gibson's (Stephanie Leonidas) shoulder, the doe-eyed 15-year-old develops an increasingly steamy crush on him. But Martin's diagnosis of John, which forces him to contemplate his mortality, is the somber note to this carefree ballad. Both Martin and Joan gain deep dimension in an absorbing episode by turns amusing and moving, solidifying both the aloof, haughty lead and the sometimes-eccentric locals. "Of All the Harbours in All the Towns" is when "Doc Martin" becomes a keeper.
REVIEWER'S NOTE: What makes a review "helpful"? Every reader of course decides that for themselves. For me, a review is helpful if it explains why the reviewer liked or disliked the work or why they thought it was good or not good. Whether I agree with the reviewer's conclusion is irrelevant. "Helpful" reviews tell me how and why the reviewer came to their conclusion, not what that conclusion may be. Differences of opinion are inevitable. I don't need "confirmation bias" for my own conclusions. Do you?
Sorry, annoyed me
jdavisjdavis3 August 2022
Warning: Spoilers
Love the show mostly so far, but not this episode. Morally crap. I hate affairs in shows... the hell is wrong with these other reviewers? Unbelievable to boot. The lie at the end so obvious. The relationship so unreal... was she like 25 years older than him or what? No worse than James Bond marrying a woman 30 years younger you say? Well maybe... well only if he was looking like a 90 year old with a 60 year old. Bah humbug.
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