14 Best TV Shows Similar to The Long Firm
Slow Horses
Jackson Lamb (Gary Oldman), River Cartwright (Jack Lowden), and the rest of the Slough House reprobates are back for Slow Horses Season 4, and things are, unsurprisingly, not good. While a bombing in a bustling London shopping center consumes most of Britain’s intelligence community, River’s grandfather, David (Jonathan Pryce), has wandered into a very different sort of fight. His memory and cognitive skills are unraveling, triggering, among other problems, a rapid increase in his paranoia. One night, someone close to him drops in for a visit, and moments later, David guns down the visitor. But is everything what it seems? Questions of what family members owe one another take center stage as David’s confused and deadly actions expose the previously largely unexplored complexity of the Cartwright family. As one member of Slough House runs to France to investigate a single errant clue, the rest of the team is left behind to protect David from Emma Flyte (Ruth Bradley), the new head of MI5’s “dogs”. While seemingly far less corrupt than her predecessors, she’s just as disinterested in tolerating the Horses’ nonsense or willing to trust their pleas for more time. Aimee-Ffion Edwards, Christopher Chung, Tom Brooke, Kadiff Kirwan, and Rosalind Eleazar are all here. You got a problem with that? (AppleTV+) Coming at the Horses from the other side is a seemingly unstoppable black-ops mercenary (Tom Wozniczka) trying to clean up the loose ends of…something. David might have once been able to fill in the blanks, but with dementia steadily robbing him of his past and his present consumed with guilt and trauma, he can’t conjure any explanations. As he stalks the members of Slough House, Diana Taverner (Kristin Scott Thomas) tries to push the new First Chair, the hesitant and PR-focused Claude Whelan (James Callis), to bury anything and everything having to do with the bombing and its apparent perpetrator. Continue Reading →
Bad Monkey
Before things go too far, it’s important to offer this disclaimer. Bad Monkey’s monkey isn’t especially naughty. Or even all that present. So people with particular opinions on animal performers, now you know. Proceed accordingly. For everyone else, Bad Monkey isn’t bad. In fact, it’s largely quite good. The series grabs your attention with an opener that accurately captures the tone of the ten episodes to come. An arrogant, nouveau riche-coded husband on honeymoon reels in a big one. Only problem is it turns out not to be a fish. Instead, a severed arm, seemingly flipping off the world, hangs off the hook. His new bride screams inconsolably as a deckhand snaps a pic of the man with his catch. On the deck above, the rent-a-captain dryly mumbles to himself about the business of making dreams come true. It is loud, over the top, funny, and a bit horrifying when you stop to think about it. Continue Reading →
A Good Girl's Guide to Murder
Ever since the pseudonymous Carolyn Keene first created the plucky heroine Nancy Drew in 1930, so-called Girl Detectives have remained an object of cultural fascination. Netflix’s riveting new series A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder introduces audiences to Pip Fitz-Amobi (Emma Myers, the breakout of Tim Burton’s Wednesday), a worthy successor to Nancy and her compatriots like Harriet the Spy. In just six tightly-written episodes, Good Girl’s Guide unspools a satisfying small town mystery that will captivate teenage fans and adult viewers alike. Eschewing her original thesis proposal on feminism in Gothic literature, self-possessed seventeen-year-old Pip decides to spend her final year of school before university investigating the mysterious disappearance of her older classmate Andie Bell (India Lillie-Davies). Andie’s boyfriend Sal (Rahul Patni) supposedly confessed to her murder before taking his own life, but Pip has her doubts from the jump, and not without reason: she may have been the last person to see the doomed couple together. Her fledgling case grows even more complicated when she connects with Sal’s charming younger brother, Ravi (Zain Iqbal), and finds herself developing romantic feelings for the first time in her life. Myers confidently anchors the fun, diverse ensemble of newcomers with spunk and aplomb, her wide blue eyes searching every scene for clues. Iqbal and Patni are perfectly cast as crush-worthy sadboys, while Asha Banks and Yasmin Al-Khudhairi (Rye Lane) stand out as Pip’s practical best friend Cara Ward and her troubled older sister, Naomi. Familiar British favorites like Anna Maxwell Martin (Becoming Jane, A Personal History of David Copperfield) and Mathew Baynton (Wonka) round out the adult side of the cast, playing Pip’s loving mother and kindly English teacher, respectively. Continue Reading →
The Decameron
To say creator Kathleen Jordan’s adaptation of The Decameron is loose is to enjoy the gift of significant understatement. The source material, an Italian collection of 100 tales “told” to one another by ten characters, was a kind of Canterbury Tales for the plague set. Or, more accurately, Tales was a Decameron for the Brits. The Italian work, after all, has about 50 years on Chaucer’s book. While the TV series does gather ten characters together, initially to celebrate the arranged wedding of Pampinea (Zosia Mamet) and Leonardo (Davy Eduard King), then to try to ride out the Bubonic, it largely ditches the tale-telling. In its place is a satirical take on today’s class inequalities smuggled onto screen under the veil of a period black comedy. While likely conceived of during or in the wake of COVID’s darkest early days, the tones and themes update nicely to now. It does not reflect our modern situation as literally as it did in, say, April 2020. Nonetheless, it smartly captures how certain global tragedies cannot be dodged and how the rich and powerful will still try at the cost of the larger society. If only it landed its jokes as well. Zosia Mamet and Saoirse-Monica Jackson learn the importance of decanting from Jessica Plummer. (Giulia Parmigiani/Netflix) It isn’t for lack of talent. Tanya Reynolds—so good in Sex Education—proves she deserves a bigger stage, stepping into one of the lead roles as the handmaiden Licisca. She finds herself tethered to the vain and selfish Filomena (Jessica Plummer) as they journey to Leonardo’s estate. How the kind and socially conscious member of the servant class evolves in isolation as she tastes luxury and power for the first time is genuinely interesting and well-acted by Reynolds. A scene where she goes from faking kindness to the hypochondriac aristocrat Tindaro (Douggie McMeekin) to genuinely delight with him feels wonderfully organic and honest. Continue Reading →
Lady in the Lake
For a show set in the mid-1960s, Lady in the Lake explores a basketful of issues relevant to today. From nearly 60 years in our past, it echoes modern “concerns” of all stripes. For example, characters range from dubious to outright hostile to the idea of Maddie (Natalie Portman) working as a journalist or Ferdie Platt (Y’lan Noel) becoming the first black detective in Baltimore. It doesn’t take much to see how that connects with today’s handwringing over DEI—bigotry dressed up to look like worries about the “most deserving person” getting the job. That the most deserving always seems to be a white man, in such concerned citizens’ opinions, is just a coincidence, no doubt. Also spotlighted in Lady in the Lake are questions about women’s autonomy over their own bodies, grooming, legalized gambling, antisemitism, and politicians throwing over the people that got them elected for “respectability”. Homophobia, stranger danger, and the ramifications of untreated childhood trauma also receive small but prominent moments of attention. Moses Ingram's too good to get lost in this series' chaos so often. (AppleTV+) If that sounds like a lot for a television series to tackle in a single seven-episode season, well, it is. As a result, the show frequently —particularly the first two to three episodes—lapses into a sort of controlled but still frantic chaos. In its efforts, led by creator Alma Har’el, to wrap its arms around everything it wants to be about, the viewer can feel battered by incidents. The series’ occasional dalliances with hallucination and visual metaphor don’t help in this regard. They’re fascinating for certain. The sixth installment’s near episode-length exploration of Maddie’s psyche stands out as a season-high. However, they also sometimes make it overly difficult for the audience to find solid footing in the narrative. Lady in the Lake’s ambition is worthy of praise, but that doesn’t necessarily translate into good television. Continue Reading →
Sunny
About fifteen years ago, an era of “complicated” protagonists ruled the television landscape. These anti-heroes—Walter White, Don Draper—were the sort of people one wouldn’t associate in their day-to-day life. Safely sealed in a flat screen, though, and viewers couldn’t get enough of them. It was a glorious time to be unlikable on TV. Still, as Erik Kain pointed out, it was an honor almost entirely reserved for men. Sunny is a late-arriving corrective, centering a fully complex and often unlikable Rashida Jones. As Suzi, Jones ditches nearly everything that makes her an on-screen appealing presence in the likes of The Office and Parks and Recreation. She also flattens the traits that make her stand out as a character worthy of empathy in projects like Silo and On the Rocks. In place of those, she offers a dead-eyed stare that only sparks to life when castigating her mother-in-law Noriko (Judy Ongg), random bureaucrats, and, of course, the titular android Sunny (voiced by Joanna Sotomura). Rashida Jones does not, and this can't be stressed enough, have time for this nonsense. (AppleTV+) It isn’t like she doesn’t have cause for anger and the thousand-mile gaze. As the opening minutes reveal, Suzi has justy lost her husband Masa (Hidetoshi Nishijima) and son in a plane crash. However, as the series unfolds, it becomes clear Suzi can’t blame her unpleasantness entirely on grief. As revealed in flashbacks, she’s been hard-drinking and foul-mouthed for some time. Additionally, although partially owed to her dyslexia, she wields her failure to learn nearly any Japanese like a cudgel. It is yet another tool for holding the world at bay. That world includes, often, her spouse. Of course, his own drinking and pile of secrets hardly made him an ideal partner either. Continue Reading →
Presumed Innocent
For a large segment of Gen X and Millennials, legal thrillers have an undeniable comfort food quality. These generational cohorts grew up as authors like Scott Turow and John Grisham rose to prominence, dominating best-seller lists. With that beachhead established, it wasn’t long before the legal thriller came to screens, large and small, via adaptations. While rarely deeply prestigious works, many, if not most, boasted big stars, well-established directors, and compelling enough storytelling. Presumed Innocent, an 8-part limited series—Apple provided critics with all but the final installment—arrives with that wind at its back for a considerable portion of the audience. It is further helped in the comfort department by being the second adaptation of the titular novel by Turow, following a well-regarded Alan Pakula-directed Harrison Ford-starring cinematic turn in 1990. The book also spawned a sequel and a made-for-TV adaptation of that sequel. Uh-oh. Jake Gyllenhaal and (Renate Reinsve) just spotted you across the bar. (AppleTV+) No one can accuse Turow’s Rusty Sabich (played here by Jake Gyllenhaal after Ford on the silver screen and Bill Pullman for the at-home audiences) of being the central star of a law and order-driven MCU. However, when it comes to legal thrillers, he’s about as close as you can get. Playing with that house money, creator David E. Kelley and star Gyllenhaal don’t exactly reinvent the wheel. Nonetheless, they offer a solid series to slip into just as summer kicks in. Continue Reading →
Eric
Eric is a tough sit. Whether that sit is worth the difficulty is a question I struggled with before tentatively arriving at yes. The story begins as a tale of a missing child, Edgar (Ivan Morris Howe), the son of Vincent (Benedict Cumberbatch) and Cassie (Gaby Hoffmann). After the couple’s latest row the night before, Edgar doesn’t wait around for them to sort themselves in the morning. Instead, he walks to school on his own as his father tries to make amends with his mother. But Edgar never arrives at school that day. Vincent is a creator and puppeteer on a formerly top-rated children’s show—think Sesame Street with no on-screen humans and only one set—with his creative partner Lennie (Dan Fogler). Edgar, aware of the show’s downturn and the need for a new puppet, has been doodling and dreaming up just the solution, the titular Eric. When Edgar disappears, Vincent’s desperate and possibly delusional reaction is to finish his son’s work on the giant felt monster. He reasons that if his son could only see the puppet on television, the boy would understand how important he was to his parents and come home. Others, confident Edgar is not gone of his accord and likely no longer alive, cannot get on board with the plan. Continue Reading →
Dark Matter
In reviewing Dark Matter, it feels fitting to follow the moral of the show’s story. While it is easy to get lost in forever puzzling over details, the far more useful—and rewarding—path is to take a step back and fully appreciate a thing. There are elements in creator/showrunner Blake Crouch’s adaptation of his own work that do not work, especially concerning pacing. And yet, by the time the credits roll on the final episode, one is largely left satisfied and, perhaps, a bit exhilarated. The temptation to dwell on each choice at the expense of the larger picture is something Jason Dessen (Joel Edgerton) knows well. But we’re already getting ahead of ourselves. Dark Matters begins with the Jason I’ll christen “our Jason” for clarity. Our Jason is a Physics professor living in Chicago with his wife Daniela (Jennifer Connelly), a former artist who now focuses more on the administrative and business sides of art, and their son Charlie (Oakes Fegley). One night, Jason meets up with his friend Ryan (Jimmi Simpson) to celebrate the latter’s academic success. The vibe is strained, with parties seemingly aware that Jason should’ve received the same award, if not over Ryan, then certainly before him. Continue Reading →
The Tattooist of Auschwitz
The Tattooist of Auschwitz opens on Lale Sokolov (Harvey Keitel in the 2000s “present-day” sequences) living in Australia. He's decided the time has come to commit his life story to paper. A nurse with writing aspirations Heather Morris (Melanie Lynskey), (the real-life writer behind the inspired by actual events but labeled historical fiction source material) is referred by someone in the community to help. With little prologue, he dives in, describing how he "volunteered" for a program about defending Jewish communities. Unfortunately, it was a trap. The train ride takes him to Auschwitz instead. While imprisoned there, he (Jonah Hauer-King in flashbacks) became one of the tattooists. The position leads him to meet the love of his life, fellow prisoner Gita Furman (Anna Próchniak). Additionally, the position gave him a certain level of consideration not accorded to others, including access to medications. On the other hand, he faces resentment among the prisoners and decades of survivor’s guilt. The book—and its two subsequent spinoffs/sequels—has a certain amount of controversy surrounding it. While I’m not an expert on the Holocaust, I feel it is at least important to acknowledge that fact. Wanda Witek-Malicka from the Auschwitz Memorial Research Center publicly worried that the book engaged in excessive “exaggerations, misinterpretations and understatements” that could render its text “dangerous and disrespectful to history.” Continue Reading →
RIPLEY
Tom Ripley doesn't exist. Not just in the sense that he's a fictional creation of thriller novelist extraordinaire Patricia Highsmith, no; as a man, Ripley is a chimera, a shadow, a formless void that hungrily sucks in whatever nourishment it can from whatever or whoever is around him. Damn the consequences. He's one of literature's (and, in the case of several cinematic adaptations, moviedom's) greatest conmen, a remora with nothing behind the eyes except the next game, the next mark, the next place to flee when suspicions run too high. Now, writer/director/showrunner Steven Zaillian has adapted the first of Highsmith's novels into an eight-episode miniseries for Netflix (it was originally slated for Showtime before they sold it), and by virtue of those pedigrees, it's maybe the best original series the streamer has put out all year. When we first meet Tom Ripley (Andrew Scott), he's a low-level grifter eking out a living with some street-level mail fraud in New York City. But one day, a private dick (Bokeem Woodbine) taps him on the shoulder and hauls him in front of a wealthy shipping magnate (filmmaker Kenneth Lonergan) for a special mission: travel to Italy on his dime to find his layabout painter-wannabe son Dickie Greenleaf (Johnny Flynn) and bring him back home to fulfill his business responsibilities. Ripley doesn't know the man, but he agrees -- the chance to start all over somewhere else (and be bankrolled for it) is too great. So he swans off to Atrani, a small beachside villa where he ingratiates himself to the pampered Dickie and his writer girlfriend, Marge (Dakota Fanning), two people as insulated by their wealth as they are by their respective artistic mediocrities. RIPLEY. (L to R) Dakota Fanning as Marge Sherwood and Johnny Flynn as Dickie Greenleaf in RIPLEY. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix © 2024 Unlike previous adaptations of the material, Zaillian barely (if ever) clues us into any kind of deeper humanity lurking under the surface for Tom Ripley. Matt Damon's version from The Talented Mr. Ripley was motivated by emotional impulse; here, Scott plays him like a reptile. There's something downright alien about his cold tilt of the head, those shark-like eyes (aided by Robert Elswit's chiaroscuro photography, which we'll get to later), the way his delivery teeters between blase deference and a flat, manipulative affect. He seems less like a desperate hanger-on than a predator, one all too happy to take rich people for everything they've got and discard them when he's sucked all the meat off their bones. He doesn't covet the lifestyles of the rich and famous, and even the script's frequent allusions to Ripley's subtextual lust for Dickie don't seem to fully account for his motivations. Continue Reading →
The Regime
It might help some to think of The Regime less as satire and more as dark farce with political opinions. Yes, there’s nothing especially new here in the series’ send-up of a paranoid autocrat, Chancellor Elena Vernham (Kate Winslet), whose withdrawal from the larger world has brought an ever-decreasing grasp of reality. But sometimes, it is enough for a story to just make you laugh and feel sick with fear for the real world. Much like creator Will Tracy’s The Menu, The Regime's advertisements suggest a different viewing experience than it delivers. And, as with that film, the audience risks missing a nasty treat if they don’t meet the series where it lives. The film arrived when “Eat the Rich” entertainment seemed to be spiking. However, The Menu’s focus didn’t lie with economics, at least not solely or predominantly. The Regime hits MAX as America is facing an eight-month nightmare Presidential election campaign goosed by the worst human being you’ve ever known, armed with his naked desire to rule entirely for personal gain and without even the slightest hint of criticism. However, the show’s goal isn’t a six-episode allegory on the excesses of executive power. The dialogue, from an array of writers including Tracy and Bodies, Bodies, Bodies writer Sarah DeLappe, often suggests Veep with a less dexterous tongue. It keeps the palace intrigue fun and quick even when it the notes feel quite familiar. The willingness to spike international incidents with amoral verbal tartness is a delight. Continue Reading →
Reacher
The Prime series remains its big, fun, very violent self. Jack Reacher (Alan Ritchson), the “has toothbrush, will travel” man, has returned to television and not a moment too soon. Reacher Season 2 is exactly the kind of low-commitment viewing one craves as the year ends and the holidays overtake everyone’s lives. While a large, jolly man busies himself filling many of our stockings, who better to enjoy than a large, angry man knocking bad guys out of their socks? Especially when, like this time, it’s personal! Reacher and Neagly (Maria Sten, back from Season 1 and fully second on the callsheet this time, thankfully) first met when they were members of the 110, an investigative military police unit. As seen in flashback, the group is the last time Reacher had anything approaching a stable group of friends. In the present day, several team members have gone missing, suggesting that perhaps someone is targeting them. Reacher connects with Neagly and the two join up with the only other two 110 members they can find. O’Donnell (Shaun Sipos) is the unit clown and womanizer turned family man and inside the beltway fixer. Dixon (Serinda Swan) is a forensic accountant/warrior who shares an obvious but unconsummated crush with Reacher. Continue Reading →