Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant! Jennifer Saunders' pilot for a a potential new series is a classic in it's own right, growing from, but not overshadowed by it's AbFab roots. It is quite unfair (although natural enough) for this one-off to be compared so heavily to Absolutely Fabulous, as it is really quite different, apart from it's raking over the coals of celebritydom.
There are some truly inspired moments here. The scene in which stage great Bonnie Langford loses the role in "Angela's Ashes" (the musical no less!) to the obviously less talented Vivienne is priceless.
The characters are really quite different to the roles the cast played in AbFab. Freda is certainly less prim and prudish than Saffron, Vivienne is calmer and less frenetic than Edina, Jackie is less vapid than Patsy, and Yitta is not the vacant animated corpse that Bubble was, but rather an arrogant, spiteful young woman. Admittedly Dora seems a bit like Mother in some ways, but Dora truly is off her rocker, whereas Mother was obviously calculating her every off-the-wall-remark as a way to drive Edina insane.
All in all, "Mirrorball" is a good time all round and deserves to be enjoyed on it's own merits, not mearly as an offshoot of the AbFab phenomenon. It is available on the AbFab Series 4 DVD set. Don't miss it!
