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12 years after the French phenomenon series Bref on Canal +, authors Kyan Khojandi, Harry Tjordmann, and Bruno Muschio are back with a new season composed of 6 episodes of 30 minutes.
If the original series consisted of very short episodes of about 1 minute 50, it was able to mark its time and propelled its cast into the spotlight. The editing is fantastic, frenetic, and gave a unique touch to this production. To the point that the style has been parodied many times.
With more than 617 million views on YouTube alone (and that doesn’t count the audience on the Canal + channel, nor the reruns), we wonder why the Canal + group didn’t want to sign for a season 2. Disney Plus France does it and therefore reaps the jackpot.
(And if you want to watch the series, and you live outside of France, you will need a VPN, in addition to the Disney Plus subscription)
bref (season 1) told the life of an ordinary 30-year-old man (played by Kyan Khojandi) sprinkled with life anecdotes and jokes from the authors, and also many cameos from the world of television comedy and French YouTube.
bref 2 (season 2) tells the story of the same ordinary 40-year-old man sprinkled with life anecdotes and jokes from the authors, and also with many cameos from the world of television comedy and French YouTube. And it tells how this hero (having no name) by not making a choice in his life, stagnated, and it was getting worse and worse for him.
With a longer format, we wondered how the frantic editing would work. Well… It passes, it’s well paced, there are very fast periods, longer periods, the episodes manage to keep the viewers on the edge of their seats.
We find the whole team of the first season and we see how their characters have evolved after 10 years. According to the hero, everyone has been successful except him. I thought that this perspective was going to be questioned at some point but it is not the case. bref 2 tells ordinary stories of ordinary people. The unpleasant characters are much too much highlighted. There are many ellipses and off-topic that last too long, especially in episodes 2 and 3. While we are looking forward to seeing the team again and discovering the rest of their story, bref lingers on the painful moments of the hero (and Kyan). It’s understandable when you know him, but it breaks the dynamic.
bref 2 doesn’t tell anything new, it’s about its ecosystem, its self-containment, its circle of friends, its appearances of characters who are constantly invited. It’s a little too much at times. It’s difficult to get attached to so many stories, via so many ellipses, flashbacks, flash-forwards.
It’s nice to watch, to hear from them, but it could have been a little out of his comfort zone.
bref 2 remains an exceptional product in the French and global audiovisual landscape, a unique way of telling stories, a TV series that is pleasant to watch, which is so rare in France.
Let’s hope that a potential bref 3 will take us somewhere else.
