Review of the series "Black Rabbit"

Starting from September 18, each subscriber of the Netflix streaming platform can watch the new crime thriller “Black Rabbit” — a series consisting of 8 episodes starring Jude Law and Jason Bateman. What to expect from this show and how to binge-watch it is described in the review below.

“Black Rabbit”

Genre crime thriller, drama
Showrunners Zach Beilin, Kate Sussman
Starring Jude Law, Jason Bateman, Cleopatra Coleman, Sope Dirisu, Amaka Okafor, Odesa Young, Dagmara Dominchik, Chris Coy, Troy Kotsur, Abby Lee, Morgan Spector
Premiere Netflix
Year of release 2025
Website IMDb

Jake Friedken is the successful owner of a thriving Brooklyn restaurant, Black Rabbit, who is looking to expand, and then he can dream of resting on his laurels. His brother Vince once initiated the restaurant business, but at some point he took a wrong turn and almost ruined everything. Later, he left the city as a walking disaster, but after getting into another bad story, he decided to return.

It seemed that now this fool could start from scratch, and Jake seemed ready to support his wayward relative despite his past troubles. But the latter hid from his brother one small but very important detail — a huge debt to local criminal elements who are determined to get the money from the debtor, with interest. Gradually, Vince’s problem becomes Jake’s problem as well, which calls into question not only his ambitious business plans but also risks much more serious consequences.

Just two months ago, a crime thriller was released in Ukrainian cinemas “The Order”, and part of the team that worked on that movie moved here. In addition to the lead actor Jude Law and Odessa Young, who were directly in front of the camera, it was the local writer Zach Beilin and executive producer Kate Sussman, who served as showrunners here. And also — director Justin Kurzel, who directed the final two episodes. You may also know the latter from the movie adaptation “Assassin’s Creed” (2016).

What else the series has inherited from that feature film is maximum gloom, and this applies to both the tone of the narrative and the deliberately faded picture. That is, the visual style literally announces that you won’t find any levity here on a candlelit afternoon, and it’s better to tune in to something completely joyless, somewhere even hopeless.

Of course, certain moments and the logic of the characters’ actions raise fair questions — the clumsy Vince is out of the question; the local thugs, who are not distinguished by their intelligence and wit, are also not intelligent, and are perfectly described as “dumb and dumber” (it even sounded in one of the dialogues, if I remember correctly). There are also some weak secondary arcs in the story, such as the lesbian relationship of the wonder chef Roxy, the shameful actions of the elderly rapist Jules, or the love interest of the character Law. These lines are nothing more than small and unimportant cogs in the machine that are not properly developed.

But all the shortcomings quickly fade into the background of the dynamic, and dramatic, development of the central plot branch of the two brothers, which clearly shows that relatives are not chosen (one insightful dialog is devoted to this topic). Not least of all, it’s interesting to watch the on-screen brotherly chemistry between Jude Law and the shaggy-bearded Jason Bateman: their relationship is one of the show’s best components, and it’s clear that the actors are giving it their all.

I am also impressed by the way the creators have worked on the structure — flashbacks from the brothers’ childhood in the room with the poster “Rocky III” and up to the recent fateful events are quite appropriate and at the same time do not distract from the main events. And in one of the episodes, the narrative is told from the perspective of several characters. In fact, it begins with a scene of robbery of exhibition jewelry in an ill-fated restaurant. But after going through a certain path with the characters, the second time around, the viewer will look at this situation in a completely different perspective.

In addition to the quality acting work on the character, about whom people usually say “how did he manage to live to his age?”, Jason Bateman reunites off-camera with his co-star from the hit “Ozark” (2017—2022) Laura Linney — both of them directed two episodes. Unfortunately, when you binge-watch it towards the end, you noticeably run out of breath – the creators still didn’t have enough energy to make the finale hit the audience’s heart. But in general, there are no regrets about watching the movie.