The Old Man

In 6 months, Jeff Bridges will turn 73 years old. Indeed, he is an old man. His character makes those grunting noises from the effort of arising in the morning, and you also overhear a very sporadic urine stream in the middle of the night. Starting in Peter Bogdanovich's seminal "The Last Picture Show," Bridges continued to build an enviable career out of numerous carefully drawn roles, each one truly unique and most of them more memorable than the last. He was finally awarded his long overdue Best Actor Oscar for "Crazy Heart" a few years ago, and then last year we almost lost him because of CoVID-19. But he's back as a beat-up old ex-spy and is perfect for and in this latest complex part.

In 4 months, John Lithgow will be 77 years old. Also by most narrow definitions, an old man. Is he the obvious villain of this story, or might he actually be the hero? You are never quite sure with a Lithgow character, and this one's no exception.

Supporting roles for such long-time pros as Amy Brenneman and Joel Gray are also well written and, of course, superbly well performed. But no mistake: this miniseries totally belongs to the one and only Jeff Bridges. And by extension, to all of us who remain his long-time fans more than a half century later. Not to be missed. 9/10.

This will be a short review. Season 1 was great.

In fact the first number of episodes were just epic, Jeff Bridges is sublime. It keeps you totally glued to see what happens next. Good back ground story and he is basically kicking ass, which less face it, is what we want to see from this so called Old man. Well, I know it is what I wanted to see anyway. It did deliver too, in buckets.

Unfortunately, season 2 has started off like a completely different show, slow, boring, bad story, I would almost stretch to say, bad acting from Lithgow. Just all around really the opposite to everything that was great about season 1. Very disappointing so far. It's looking like they should have just made a mini series and left it at that.

Great cast, great dialogue, so much promise in the first 3/4 of the series.. but dang, that ending is profoundly, inexcusably lame.

The building intensity, the purpose, the complexity, the deepening mystery, the dogged tenacity, the beautifully crafted promise of fully realised themes and arcs... simply vanish into thin air. Never existed. No payoff. All your emotional investment and you get nada. Donuts.

The finale is rushed to reveal the 'mystery' which is more of a trite twist you can see a mile off and you're left with at least five big things completely unresolved.

Ultimately, and very unfortunately, an unrewarding use of time and energy - possibly moreso for the actors and filmmakers than us poor viewers.

Remember how awesome Detectives was? Now imagine that with a Scooby Doo ending. Scooby Don't.

This show starts super strong with great actions and a slow roll out of backstory that leaves you very intrigued. Once you are caught up by episode 4, things aren't going so well. Lithgow and Bridges are excellent. Shawcat is kind of a boat anchor, delivering every line almost in monotone. None of the characters are particularly endearing. As the plot development and action slows down after a few episodes, a lot of awkward dialogue fills its place. It seems clear that the writers were trying to recreate the style of The Counselor, screenplay written by Cormac McCarthy, but not doing such a great job. The more literary style of the The Counselor left a lot of viewers confused. How much more so will a bad copy.

I'll keep watching, hoping things get better.

I watched this miniseries because of Jeff Bridges and John Lithgow. They never disappoint, but the plot and script sure did. So much of the plot was full of holes, and the supporting cast often came off as wooden. A thriller like this should never leave an audience bored at times. Sadly, this did for me.