Two episodes in and I'm already hooked. Technically speaking, this series is very good (it's directed by David Fincher, of course it's good) and it stays true (so far) to the real-life crimes it was based on. I can't say the same for the characters, and how close they are to the people who really did this work, but considering their names are different and the book they adapted wasn't some sort of biography, most of their personal (love) lives must be fictitious or at least overtly dramatized.
You see, this series here isn't some kind of good cop, bad cop chase villains and shoot and explode a lot of stuff and at the end of the day (or episode) they go back to their wives and sleep like babies. No. There are way too many series like that, so search elsewhere if that's what you want, because you won't find that here.
Mindhunter is slow. Very slow. At first it might look like an simple thriller but actually it tells the story of two FBI agents in their pursuit to, as very precisely said by Holt McCallany's character, "understand how crazy thinks". But that doesn't come easily. Crazy is crazy. You gotta be crazy to understand crazy. But that doesn't stop naïve Holden Ford from interviewing the most despicable real-life psychopaths alive in America in the late 70's to develop the ideas that will become the tenets of the criminal profiling system.
As I said before, Mindhunter is directed by David Fincher, and as expected from his work, it's impeccable, both pacing and cinematography are top-notch. At the end of the episode you will be like "wait, that's it?" as the credits roll and the song keeps playing like the story is still going on. And somehow you are watching the next episode.
Writing and dialogue are great too. All very natural and haunting. Damn psychos could very much be the real ones. And that gets me to the acting, from what I've seen there's enough to say it's fantastic. The characters are brought to life by the actors. Also, the chemistry between characters Holden Ford and Bill Tench is incredibly real and sometimes, even through the bleakness of their work's nature, hilarious.
To finish off, I'll just say the biggest review cliché: Mindhunter is not for everyone. I know you know everyone says it, but it's truer in this case. If my review and the trailer got your attention, you gotta watch it. If it didn't, you'll probably hate Mindhunter. That's how it goes.
