If The Boroughs ends up giving you a Stranger Things hangover, don't dismiss it as some sort of accident. Firstly, the eight-episode series is executive produced by The Duffer Brothers, who took us to Hawkins and placed us in the company of Eleven and her posse. Secondly, the older characters assembled in The Boroughs, too, are pitted against a supernatural threat. These adults—Sam Cooper (Alfred Molina), Renee (Geena Davis), Judy and Art Daniels (Alfre Woodard and Clarke Peters), Paz Navarro (Carlos Miranda), and Wally Baker (Denis O'Hare)—act like little kids as they plan to confront the evil lurking within the titular retirement community: a supernatural force that feeds on the one thing most precious to them—time. The serene, sunny landscape hides creepy monsters that drain something vital from the elderly residents while they sleep at night. As a result, these people lose years of their lives. Someone who might have lived another five years dies within mere months—or even days—because the creatures leave them weak, sick, and exhausted. When Sam and his friends decide to take matters into their own hands, they don't look so different from the Hawkins kids who bravely, amusingly confront monsters.
But unlike Stranger Things, The Boroughs comes with a twist that takes the tag of "evil" away from the otherworldly creatures and places it squarely on wealthy humans. The Boroughs wants to make a statement. Is it "The rich are blood-sucking, greedy idiots" or "Humans are so selfish that they consume resources through ugly exploitation"? Yes and yes. Blaine Shaw (Seth Numrich), the CEO of the retirement community, preaches care and comfort for the elderly, but you can be sure that he's responsible for something insidious. His smooth face, neatly combed hair, and calm voice feel carefully manufactured, immediately raising suspicion. Blaine is a walking, talking cliché of a bad billionaire, and Numrich never quite breaks free from the confines of stereotypical expressions. Both the actor and the character exist merely to fulfill a narrow function. We are already familiar with these wealthy-asshole types, and Numrich brings nothing new to the table. As Blaine's wife Anneliese, Alice Kremelberg somewhat redeems herself through a gaze that alternates between sensuality and intensity. Nonetheless, there is little for her to do here except move through scenes with determination. Both Blaine and Anneliese come across as thin ornamental plot devices. They don't leave a lasting impression; they are forgettable villains.
Even the series, overall, never becomes anything more than "mild fun." There is no real weight in the characters' grief. Claire (Jena Malone) tells Sam that he's not the only person who has lost someone, that he should start looking beyond his own pain. But the emotional distance this creates in their father-daughter relationship exists mainly to justify the scene where Claire, instead of believing Sam's talk about monsters, checks him into The Manor, the community's colorful asylum. And what about Jack's (Bill Pullman) death and the fact that he and Judy loved each other? It merely motivates Judy to pay closer attention to the secret meetings between Wally and Sam, eventually drawing her into their investigation of the strange happenings around them. Art eventually learns about Judy's affair, but the matter is resolved quickly through a few pallid lines. All this suggests that, instead of expanding or reflecting on the characters' emotions, The Boroughs treats them as cogs in the plot wheel so that the story can dutifully check its boxes and arrive at its predetermined destination. It has a PG spirit that constantly reaches for cheerfulness.
Sam and his friends possess a youthful, fighter-like spirit, proudly showing off their surgical scars as though they had been earned on a battlefield. During these early introductory scenes—where friendships are formed, and the central mystery remains concealed—The Boroughs oscillates between ominousness and ease. What keeps you engaged is the fine cast and a basic curiosity: what exactly is happening? However, you don't need to wait until the final episode to see where everything is headed. The story The Boroughs tells is so predictable that you quickly see its hand. The surprises aren't surprising; they merely fill in a few simple blanks, revealing certain rules and explaining how things operate in the series. Creators Jeffrey Addiss and Will Matthews don't treat their material as a vehicle for plot-level surprises. They approach it like a task that must be completed within a fixed runtime. No wonder The Boroughs moves mechanically. It's neither scaled for spectacle nor intimate emotion. It's made for viewers who want to fill the void left by Stranger Things—people who miss the show but don't want to revisit it. It can also be viewed as Netflix trying to recreate the success of a hit.
What ultimately makes The Boroughs unremarkable is its lack of freshness—or even a fresh approach to familiar ideas and themes. At its core, the show is about embracing death and accepting it as an inevitable part of life. The results, however, are far from profound. They are faux-profound, filled with shots of characters briefly expressing sadness or inner conflict. There is a wealth of drama in the choice Wally must make between his cancer and eternal life, but the show merely gestures toward the dilemma before abandoning it in favor of the safest, most sanitized option. Also, I don't quite know what to make of the fact that, in a show urging viewers not to fear death, we still get that tired cliché where someone, while dying, shares a sentimental heart-to-heart conversation with a loved one, only to be magically revived a few minutes later. Maybe the series should swallow its own mantra before preaching it. For a show about young-at-heart characters making risky choices to do what's right, The Boroughs itself is safe, tame, and ordinary. It's feeble and formulaic; it's old in spirit.
Final Score - [5/10]
Reviewed by - Vikas Yadav
Follow @vikasonorous on Twitter
Publisher at Midgard Times