Well, there were certainly huge expectations when this episode was "found by chance in the national television archives - presented with much fanfare as the "forbidden" episode of Malo Misto which was hidden away for 48 years ever since it premiered, banned after it was screened for the first time because it criticized the authorities etc.
Well, it's not a proper episode by any means, it's a holiday special made fror the New Year's Eve program of TV Zagreb (now Croatia's national television, HRT), chronologically set some time randomly before the last episode, or not really, as there is some mild breaking of the fourth wall. In any case, it follows Dr. Luigi & Bepina as they travel to Zagreb, their train ride, their walk around Zagreb, a chance encounter with Roko & Andja, with Luigi reminiscing of his days in Zagreb as a young man, where he met and knew a ton of famous people.
Now, it works at times, the actors doing very much fine, but the script... OK, so much is written about the "criticism of the government etc.". First, it comes as a strangely ham-fisted remark by Bepina, lacking subtlety and cohesion with the rest of the dialogue (a remark how nothing's good in the country), continues with a legitimate critique of people who "don't do their work and get paid for it", with the others being more about Zagreb's symbols being removed/treated badly - them going from place to place saying how this has changed, how that has changed - making somewhat more sense. It's somewhat bold, perhaps, but can partly be boiled down to reminiscing on how times have changed. Though, honestly Smoje, a left-wing patriot and a level-headed, sensible man, had no qualms with criticizing/mocking the... needless and less sensible acts of the government - regardless of his political leanings - and he has done bolder than this.
The humor and the charm of the original series and their characters works at times, but the humor is often forced and not as inspired as before, with the main detractor being the fact that Luigi was turned into an all-out lecher, perpetually horny (as is Roko, though he gets far less screen time), perhaps, which just isn't cute or funny at any point, a running joke that wears its welcome out fast. The interplay between characters works at times, at others... less than in the original. And then everything devolves into barely-linked random and sub par musical numbers, a very much cringe-inducing can-can routine with Luigi in the middle and then it fizzles out. Luigi's namedropping of everyone famous who was in Zagreb during some vague period and talk on how he partied with them just doesn't work either, it's forced and adds further cringe. Bepina's "winning" more arguments here, shows some emancipation at times, but ultimately stays very much and fully the good old gullible, eternally loyal Bepina.
Interestingly, it's fully respectful of Zagreb's culture and history, a tribute to it of sorts coming from Dalmatia, not lampooning any aspect of it at all. The characters ARE after all guests. But still, it creates a sort of an unintended? "plebs from the province visiting the cultural metropolis" feeling at moments which I'm not sure works in a series like this, in fact, supporting negative stereotypes about Dalmatians in a way too (self-deprecating humor on one side, the other side not touched upon at all), but hey, guess it was playing to the public there...
I simply don't buy that it was banned because of Smoje's critique. It's simply put the worst thing Smoje and Marusic have done. By bounds and leaps. It just sucks, it takes beloved characters and makes them act unnaturally and unconvincingly in a bad way. It makes you warm inside (Luigi's mutterings for example), which is the goal of specials like this, then kills the feeling by bad writing (the comment that the script was "ispastrocan" in the opening credits is very much spot on.
It's more like the creators (and the television that aired it) were ashamed of it for being bad and wanted it to disappear because it's bad, and now it's being brought back partly for political reasons - to demonstrate "how everything was censored in Yugoslavia" - something beaten by the very fact that this was, indeed, aired. I'm somewhat glad I've seen it from a completist perspective, but, really, it should've stayed buried and forgotten.
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