Yahoo Lifestyle Performers of the Week: Ryan Kiera Armstrong and Kyriana Kratter
THE PERFORMERS | Ryan Kiera Armstrong and Kyriana Kratter
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THE SHOW | Disney+’s Star Wars: Skeleton Crew
THE EPISODE | “Zero Friends Again” (Dec. 31, 2024)
THE PERFORMANCES | The Skeleton Crew kiddos have endured moments of peril, found time for tweenage tomfoolery, and one even fielded a sweet forehead kiss. But it wasn’t until this week’s antepenultimate episode, “Zero Friends Again,” that the Star Wars series took time to explore any knotty dynamics — such as between Fern and KB, played by Armstrong and Kratter.
After Fern, KB, Wim and Neel were spat out of the chute beneath the Lanupa treasure room trap door, Fern pitched a plan to scale the nearby cliff to return to The Onyx Cinder parked up top. KB, though, for a first time challenged her bestie, deeming the idea “impossible” and “not perfect.”
“You can’t just assume there aren’t any” other options, KB argued when met by Fern’s puzzlement. “If you were actually interested” in what I have to say, “actually listening for once, maybe we could actually talk about something.”
The exchange was as icy cold as it was abrupt, with Kratter’s performance hinting at a deep-seated issue, and Armstrong selling us on Fern’s concealed sadness as the friends parted ways. “I guess we’re splitting,” a crushed Fern offered. “Fine,” KB weakly confirmed. “I guess we are.”
The young actresses also shined separately. When the cybernetically assisted KB confided in Wim that she is suffering from “corroded augs” and led him through a makeshift repair, Kratter laced her line readings with just the right amount of added hurt. “Ever since my accident, Fern always assumed I could do anything that she could, like I’m not different,” she sighed. “But I am different.”
Alas, KB fears that if she pushes Fern away by flagging how she is differently abled, “I’ll have zero friends again” — as in the episode title. Heartbreaking stuff.
Armstrong, meanwhile, got to play something a lot more comic and heroic, as Fern (with her “long spider legs,” as Neel put it) cleverly helped her less-agile ally ascend the steep cliffside ladder.
When the pairs of kids eventually reunited at the landing pad, Fern rushed over to KB and gave her a long, warm hug, effusing, “I am so, so, so sorry for not listening” — the repeated “so” so very kid-like, yet unarguably affecting. KB in turn acknowledged, “I was afraid to tell you when there are things I can’t do.” Here, Armstrong and Kratter managed to evoke, surely in many a viewer, that childhood feeling of quarreling with a bestie, but ultimately realizing, as each girl sweetly declared here, “You’re my best friend!” And probably always will be.
Scroll down to see who got Honorable Mention shout-outs this week…
HONORABLE MENTION: Jacob Lofland
Turns out, Landman’s quietest character is also the one with the most to say. In Sunday’s episode, Cooper broke his relative silence to help Ariana stand firm against the oil company’s lawyers, and Jacob Lofland played the scene as though a dam had broken within his laconic character. We couldn’t get enough. All of Cooper’s affection for the grieving widow mixed with his hatred of MTex’s shady legal practices to produce a blistering monologue that Lofland delivered with compelling intensity. In addition to being supremely satisfying to watch (the look on Rebecca’s face as he spoke!), Lofland’s performance showed us new, really attractive angles on his heretofore kinda-puzzling character. We can’t wait to see more. — Kimberly Roots
HONORABLE MENTION: Diane Morgan
As hopelessly clueless TV journalist Philomena Cunk, UK comedian Diane Morgan reaches new heights of inspired stupidity, confronting real-life experts with the most moronic questions imaginable. After the hilarious triumph of Cunk on Earth, Morgan’s Cunk returned this week with Netflix’s Cunk on Life, a faux documentary that saw Cunk investigating the very origins of human existence… and learning nothing along the way. Morgan’s unblinking deadpan was in fine form as Cunk puzzled over man’s place in the animal kingdom (“What do the creatures want? And why do they refuse to tell us?”) and asked esteemed scholars brain-dead questions like “Did Michelangelo use a really long brush [when painting the Sistine Chapel], or did he have really long arms?” It takes serious smarts to be as dumb as Philomena Cunk is, and Morgan proved here she’s quite smart indeed. — Dave Nemetz
HONORABLE MENTION: Park Sung-hoon
The first instinct was to single out Park Sung-hoon for Squid Game‘s Season 2 finale, in which Hyun-ju/Player 120 rose to the insurrectionary occasion and proved to be a badass. But upon further reflection, it was the preceding episode in which the actor most impressed us. As Hyun-ju’s alliance repeatedly split off into “Mingle” groups of assorted sizes, forcing her at times to invite acceptance by strangers, Park perfectly communicated the transgender woman’s fits of anxiety. [Squid Game‘s creator said it was “near impossible” to find/cast an openly trans Korean actor, given that society’s LGBTQ+ attitudes.] Then, when Yung-mi was tragically shut out of the anteroom that Hyun-ju had hurried into with four others, Park absolutely shattered our hearts with a plaintive wail and bereft look through the slim window, at her newly made, but imminently executed, friend. — M.W.M.
Which performance(s) knocked your socks off this week? Tell us in the comments!
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