Make or Break 2022 S01 HDR 2160p WEB h265-BIGDOC

Review: "e;Make Or Break"e;, A Must-Watch Series

It promised a lot, and it pretty much delivers. Here's our look at pro surfing's most anticipated show in years.

Hannah Anderson
29th, Apr 2022.

What is surfing? This question is posed almost as soon as you turn on Apple TV's new series. Is it a sport? Is it a feeling? Is it a lifestyle? It's a question that the WSL hopes can be answered and monetised by "e;Make Or Break"e;, in a way their own TV slate has never managed.

One thing's for sure: This is a must-watch series, an insight into modern pro surfing like nothing before it. "e;Make Or Break"e; shows you that at the very least, competitive surfing is as raw as any mainstream sport. It deep dives into the idea that the characters wandering the WSL's CT landscape are not the gods they are built up to be, but like you and I, mere mortals trying to succeed.

My initial urge was to compare the series to "e;F1: Drive to Survive"e;, knowing that the production company responsible for the Netflix hit has chosen surfing as its next muse. It's quickly apparent that surfing action is harder than F1 for them to capture and represent. The colour grade is reminiscent of a fairy-floss, cartoon world where the ocean's blue is more saturated than the sky.

It also seems that surfing is a more complex sport to build tension around than is F1. But as anyone who watches surfing would know, it's not as simple as first across the line. There are competitive tactics and nuances to surfing that aren't really explained in this season.

Maybe that's the appeal though - it's not really about the surfing. It's about the characters.

You think you know these athletes, be it through post heat interviews or their social media, but watching this, you quickly realise these are hollow fronts. The access in "e;Make Or Break"e; is unparalleled. There's swearing, there's crying, there's drinking, there's serious conversations about difficult stuff like sexism and mental health, and there's even allegations of un-sportsmanlike conduct! Who'd have thought.

The series doesn't follow the structure of a CT calendar year. Instead it tells human stories that draw you into the tour obliquely. We are thrown into the '21 CT-starting Pipeline event through the eyes of Tyler Wright and John John Florence, with cameos from Stephanie Gilmore and Kelly Slater.

As an onlooker, I think it's hard to avoid the feeling John just wants to surf. His mindset around competition has always been a cloud of mystery surrounding the Hawaiian demigod. It's been done before but there's a great parallel drawn here between Kelly's deep analysis of competition, energy and feeling, and John's almost pure desire to surf. Somehow his joy for surfing translates to winning world titles, almost by accident. John sums up this relationship perfectly: "e;He's (Kelly) one of the scariest competitors to have in a heat out there (at Pipeline), you have to take it seriously."e; As if to say, John doesn't always take it seriously?

The episode also explores the comeback of Tyler Wright. The camera drops you into the living room of younger brother Mikey, and the brother/sister dynamic is in full swing, showing a Tyler we haven't seen before - a quirky, funny young woman, far from the image of a well oiled competitive machine. When she confidently states to the camera, "e;Surfing is sexist"e;, you're hearing it from someone you suddenly feel like you know. She put this belief into practice with the Box to Box production crew, by the way, making it a requirement that they hire a woman camera operator, the fantastic Mags Gavan.

The series goes on to break down several more classic personality types, under different pressures: The Brazilian Storm, Rookies, Conquering Demons, Chasing the Queen and The Finals.

Some of the episode titles are self-explanatory, others catch you by surprise. Conquering Demons is a window into the world of Filipe Toledo, an episode that really evokes deep compassion within the viewer. Filipe discusses his struggles with his mental health, and about how he looks to be a vessel for those around him to open up about their difficulties. While men's mental health has been a public issue for years now, it feels like this is the first time an active member of the surfing elite has opened up about these struggles publicly, with the aim of helping not only themselves but the people around them.

Chasing the Queen takes you to the Mexico event and behind the smile of style queen Stephanie Gilmore. The main question seems to be if Steph's surfing is relevant - in her mind, if in nobody else's. But the highlight is an on-camera blow-up between Sage Erickson and Tatiana Weston-Webb, after Tati appears to have tricked Sage into a priority interference.

"e;F-king cheap!"e; Sage tells her, back on the beach. "e;I would expect more from you than f-ken that shit."e;

"e;She's calling me cheap,"e; says Tatiana, showering off. "e;She's saying that I f-king cheated, da da da.

"e;I'm just playing the game, man."e;

A tantalising view of what it's really like to be in a WSL heat - and something you never heard or saw on the event broadcast, even though it happened right there, in front of the cams.

While I'm sure surfing for you and I will always be a feeling, this series shows the serious implications of doing it as a job, and the kind of person you become in the process. For surf fans, it'll already be a huge winner.

But when you recall that "e;F1: Drive To Survive"e; took a season to settle in, you've got to think there's some gold up ahead. Season two of "e;Make Or Break"e; is in production, and 2022 is already way more hectic than '21. By the time that's out, it won't matter if you're a surf fan or not.

General
Complete name: make.or.break.2022.s01e01.hdr.2160p.web.h265-bigdoc.mkv
Format : Matroska
Duration : 43 min 58 s

Video
Format/Info : High Efficiency Video Coding
Bit rate : 23.3 Mb/s
Width : 3 840 pixels
Height : 2 160 pixels
Frame rate : 23.976 (24000/1001) FPS

Audio
Format/Info : Enhanced Audio Coding 3
Bit rate : 768 kb/s
Channel(s) : 15 objects / 6 channels
Language : English

Subtitles : English [Forced], English, Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese Simplified, Chinese Traditional, Chinese Yue, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Estonian, European Spanish, Finnish, French, French Canadian, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin American Spanish, Latvian, Lithuanian, Malay, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Portuguese Brazilian, Russian, Slovak, Slovenian, Swedish, Tamil, Telugu, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, Vietnamese

Screens