The Sympathizer

Excellent casting and all brilliant actors. Fun, intense and with some slightly surreal twists and a nice touch of dark comedy in addition. A nice and fresh take to the usually fairly cliche spy genre. I couldn't take my eyes off the screen for a second in fear of missing a point or quirky twist of events. Robert Downey Jr is brilliant in 4 (or is it 5?) slimy roles, and he does each one brilliantly. But every single actor, main and others, are so well cast and brilliantly portraying their characters. I haven't read the book and don't intend to, so I've had the pleasure of being entirely unprepared, hence free/unbiased and able to just lean back and enjoy the ride. This is the best I've seen in a long time.

People expect serious tv series like Band of Brothers, Chernobyl, Shogun or The Last of Us. But this is Edgar Wright's style comedy but tv show. Funny, Engaging, Interesting and Good Acting. This is better Comedy than F. R. I. EN. D. S or Oscar bait serious WAR movies like Saving Private Ryan, Hacksaw Ridge and 1917 which are overrated. People's imagination go War movies or series not serious low rating. If you like What We do in the Shows, Tropic Thunder, Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World, or any Edgar Wright's Movies like I did You will have a Wonderful time and have a Fun watching the show unless if you are expecting serious war TV show.

I had high expectations for The Sympathizer but it didn't really pan out like I hoped it would.

Robert Downey Jr. Puts in an Emmy-bait performance, playing multiple roles, but they all seemed to be the same guy with just slight variations. There's a story-based reason for this if you stick it out till the end but it still did not come off well, watching a parade of cliches march through the story in lieu of well-rounded characters.

Another major mistake was casting an actor who is obviously 100% Vietnamese as a Eurasian character, which necessitated silly things like awkward looking blue contact lenses and white makeup that must have been stolen from Michael Jackson's cosmetics case.

The actor who played Bon was good though. The story always came alive when he was in a scene. The best episode was the one dealing with a zany movie about the Vietnam War and shot in Napa (??? Must have been a cheap quickie, not something Coppola or Scorsese would have stooped to).

The Vietnamese refugee community was fun, especially the demented General. But the lead character was always lying and being evasive, running away from himself, not even sure who he was. I guess that was the point of the story but when you have an unappealing lead character, it drags down the story.

Worth watching, but only just barely. HBO's glory days of prestige productions seems to be waning. Under Zaslav, I don't expect even productions of this caliber. Zaslav thinks HBO is a good brand to slap on a Harry Potter series.

I do not write many reviews, usually when I am really blown away or feel that a movie or show is treated/viewed unfair or too harsh.

When I read about the book "the sympathizer" was being adapted into a mini series, it was thrilling. It was a great read and kept me awake for a few nights.

Episode 1 of the tv show was okay, followed by two serious letdowns. The fourth episode made up for it in certain aspects, somehow it was a parody on a previous parody, starring Robert Downey Jr, named "Tropic Thunder". Coming to that actor, is where I personally see the whole problem with the sympathizer show. It appears to be a vanity project for Iron Man. He takes on multiple roles but excells in none, aside from the weird movie director. Neither his CIA spook nor the cultural sucker professor are well done.

So, why even give it a five out of ten? For the 1st and 4th episode, for it being a show set in cool locations and including dark moments in history. Overall tho, I have to force myself to keep on watching, not looking forward to soak up the next episode.

I had hopes for this show especially with Park Chan Wook involved. It was interesting to see RDJ play different roles but no one would be surprised with his versatility in acting skills. The show started off decent but felt the show just wasn't executed in the best way possible. The story felt dragged out each episode with only a seven episode count and although it was nice to see some Asian representation, I just didn't care much for any of the characters. They might've been better off with doing a 2 hour movie. The satire tone worked on some parts but really was overdone throughout the show. I expected something more to keep me engaged and feel some type of emotional attachment but it never delivered. Considering that Hoa Xuande was playing a Vietnamese communist spy, I wanted to see more scenes that made you want to empathize more for the character so by the time the ending came, you'd feel satisfied with the outcome of his character.