The Long Song

The Long Song hinges on the relationship between July and Caroline, and both Lawrence and Atwell’s performances meet this challenge. Atwell is terrific as the benign but awful Caroline, and Lawrence matches her as the whip-smart July.

“The Long Song” leans hard on its narration to speed things along and tie it all together. (The series was co-written by Levy and “Becoming Jane” scribe Sarah Williams.) This by and large works fine, with the notable exception of July and Robert’s whirlwind romance. ... By the end of the final episode, it’s clear that the series’ key uniting element is Lawrance. Playing July from a sly teenager to a young mother to a thoroughly bruised woman, Lawrance commands the screen in every iteration of the character.

Masterpiece's lively The Long Song, an usually sensual three-part fable of slavery in 1830s Jamaica, is over before you know it. [1 - 14 Feb 2021, p.7]

The Long Song is incredibly moving.

A beautiful, moving, horrifying adaptation of her unsimple tale, that honours the source and its subject.

The Long Song is weak where A Suitable Boy is strong, but happily it’s also strong where A Suitable Boy is weak—in the level of nuance its storytelling achieves. ... All told, it’s a very good miniseries that should have been great.