I really enjoyed this.

Lyn-Manuel Miranda is widely and deservedly regarded as a genius and this musical/film adds more evidence to support that.

Clever, funny, rapid-fire lyrics blend with an (until this musical was created) under regarded figure of US history. But his genius is even more evident in his decision to pitch a musical where most of the white historical cast are portrayed by Black American performers... with hip hop music at its spine. Originality is king if you want to make memorable art.

The cast in this production are luminescent. They may not all be names theatre goers will readily recognise but you've seen many of them on TV and film. There's even a key figure played by a semi-regular from Glee (singing a song that sounded very Tim Minchin to me).

As a huge fan of musicals I was always going to like this. The flip-side of this is that I judged it against the others I've seen and loved.

So yes, its hands don at least 8 stars (and most people say more than that, and that's fine) but some of the things I regarded as flaws held me back.

Relationships - no real kick-arse relationships of emotional depth except for the one who dies midway through the second act. And while it was portrayed and told well, I felt it failed to resonate as much as it could have by the lack of foreshadowing the bond. The relationship with his wife seemed tacked on and the hinted relationship with another woman (won't add a spoiler here) never delivered. The fact it was never established as fact in the real life story of Hamilton was no doubt part of the reason, but including the hint that goes nowhere served little purpose.

The story - Some stories are light by nature (Grease, Little Shop of Horrors) but they at least have a powerful relationship at their base. Some are significant because of the story they cover (Les Mis, Rent)... and they also mostly have a powerful relationship or two in the midst. I know the purpose of telling Hamilton's story was to share details of an almost forgotten figure, but I kinda feel like he deserved to be forgotten. Definitely an intellect, but his role in the War of Independence was bureaucratic, his additions to legislature were significant, but again bureaucratic. If they had hung some of the story on a significant moment rather than to provide a greatest hits package of his life, maybe there was more power to be had? Having seen it and enjoyed it, I still wonder "why Hamilton?"

Anyway, those are just some of my personal misgivings and I DID love the film/musical. Miranda is the genius in this case and while it's very easy for people on the sideline, like me, to critique or fiddle with the idea, there's no idea at all without his amazing mind.

You really should see this.

Hamilton is absolute dog shit. I'm not a musical fanatic but I can get into musicals most of the time. But this is just a bad story. It's stretched an hour longer than it needed and got extremely repetitive halfway through. I'm a huge fan of history but this is not the story to make into a 3 hour play. Hamilton is not Alcibiades or Hong Xiuquan or Napoleon or Sulla. Historically Hamilton is interesting for what he was NOT able to accomplish but the play just gives him God mode and everyone loves him to the point that they're also all jealous of him. He's a glorified accountant/banker with sexual controversy that only makes you dislike him. Weirdly the play implies that it shouldn't make you dislike him and that it isn't a big deal while simultaneously showing that it was extremely important in his downfall. There's just way too many songs that are purely about gossip in this play and honestly (and yes I know this is one of the central concepts for the whole thing... but) the rapping was just cheesy as fuck and a continued reminder that you are watching a melodramatic play rather than engrossing you in a compelling story.

tldr: It's boring and over half of the dialogue is cheesy gossip rap, it stretched the history way too thin and has terrible pacing, Hamilton is turned into a man where his only flaw is that he fucked bitches all day every day and even his enemies love him, and the story is never sucking you in because it's all so melodramatic. I have no idea what people see in this other than minority representation, which is fine but it doesn't make the story bearable.

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW, NOW THAT WAS AN AMAZING EXPERIENCE!!!!!!!

Having seen a lot of Broadway shows in person, I was sad that I wouldn't be seeing one this summer. But boy was I wrong as when they announced that Hamilton will be coming early to Disney+ I immediately was hyped and couldn't wait to watch it. This is just such an amazing experience with everything in the show being flawless and this might just be my new favourite show.

Every single actor in this show played their parts so perfectly it was unbelievable and the talent on and off stage was just off the scales, just to highlight a few Lin-Manuel Miranda (Alexander Hamilton / Writer), Jonathan Groff (King George), Phillipa Soo (Eliza Hamilton), Daveed Diggs (Marquis de Lafayette / Thomas Jefferson), Leslie Odom Jr. (Aaron Burr) and just so many more just killing it.

The story is so good as well as it gives you a lesson in some American history but with some of the catchiest songs I have ever heard, just to name a few that I love would be difficult, but my favourites are You'll Be Back and The Room Where It Happens.

I urge you to watch this as honestly, it is the perfect family entertainment (maybe 12A) and it will have something for everyone. To people who say they don't like musicals, please give this a try as I have suggested it to two people who are not hugely into musicals and they loved this.

I guess it's a musical, and the world needs more of them, so there is that going for it. And I guess the races are swapped so... that is supposed to make it really good for reasons that aren't really clear.

But, really, it's void of wit and insight, it is completely insulting to history with the only thing that seems accurate and true to life is that Hamilton existed and was Secretary of State

And the views expressed by Hamilton are the least Hamiltonian views you're ever going to see.

If you've ever read him, you kind of wonder if this is based on the same Alexander Hamilton.

1776 got a LOT of history wrong for artistic liberties, but at least the theme was accurate and it got more right than wrong.

Hamilton doesn't even try. It's the story of Hamilton written by people that haven't even heard of his Report on Manufacturing and the economy he created.

A Disappointment

This is a musical not made for people outside of the USA. I had to watch the thing again and wiki Hamilton to try to figure out who was who except for some of the bigger names.

Going by the poster, this is was meant to be some attempted rise to fame of Harry Potter in Hollywood.
The casting was varied, which is great generally, but not representative of history (noone looked like what they should have).
Historical themes seemed to be swapped around and added in for convenience-sake.
Some performances were good, Soo, Groff and Diggs, whilst others (MIranda - who was better in Mary Poppins Returns) just felt flat and tired.
It felt like 6 or so cameras were placed and then just recorded.
And the choreography was distracting at times, not complimentary.
And character development - the only one who shows any is Soo's character.

This might be a great musical, but it is not a great movie (despite what people are reviewing it as). It is hard to follow as a citizen of the world who does not know US political history details nor its players. Its cinematography, casting and set pieces felt lazy (this could have been turned into grand cinema).
And it was overly long...people might expect this type of thing to go for hours on West End to get their money's worth, but 2hrs 40 is overkill in this medium.

The hype behind this made me think this was brilliant. I was majorly disappointed.