A Teacher

Mara and Robinson give Fidell and fellow directors Andrew Neel and Gillian Robespierre everything they need and more to make this relationship work on screen, for all its soft moments and jagged edges. ... One of the most daring and complex series of 2020.

There’s little about A Teacher that should feel comfortable. FX on Hulu’s latest miniseries focuses on the relationship between a teacher and her underage high school student, and creator Hannah Fidell does everything possible to sell this romance. Yet it’s that grueling feeling of discomfort that makes this miniseries work.

Robinson, with his boyish, sad-eyed beauty and quiet charm, deftly manages Eric’s transition from lovestruck kid to haunted young adult. He and Mara have a palpable chemistry (but don’t worry, folks — Robinson is 25). As Claire, Mara does her best work after the affair is exposed.

A stunning character study that understands all of the stakes and implications of the story it is telling. And if you saw Fidell’s 2013 film, this version is very, very different, and goes further in many ways. The story is all the richer for doing so. It is a fascinating consideration, well told. And well worth your time.

Robinson, in particular, delivers a nuanced performance in a series that could best be improved by less build-up and even more exploration of the affair’s victim.

A Teacher is not about the guys. This is a star vehicle for two women — Mara in front of the screen and Hannah Fidell behind it. ... If you want to see a creative female mind exploring how female power, when it runs into the brick wall of societal taboo, can be self-destructive, A Teacher is your show.

Given its content, the miniseries could easily have been superficially scintillating, but instead, it’s purposefully disquieting and thoroughly disturbing, anchored by strong performances from Mara and Robinson that underscore how our gendered stereotypes are failing those who need protection most.

Fidell, who writes the first two episodes and the finale and directs six out of 10 episodes, takes pains to make the lines blurry. Even the cinematography has an uncertain haze to it. Mara plays this up with an extraordinary multilayered performance designed to throw us off balance and at various times she leaves the viewer unsure of what to think.

A Teacher lingers a little too long in this pre-catastrophe phase, which is surprising, given how economical Fidell is otherwise in her storytelling. ... The pensive latter episodes are the fallout, and at the center is Eric, who always had more to lose. They’ve switched places, or perhaps are finally seeing themselves for the first time. A Teacher’s lessons are all the more devastating for appearing incomplete.

This A Teacher isn’t a stretched-out “five-hour movie” of her original vision, but a miniseries that feels much more fleshed-out and thought-through, with surprisingly little overlap between the two projects.

Robinson does justice to his developing identity, imparting multiple age-appropriate layers of depth: charm, intelligence, naivety, contradictory flashes of arrogance and fragility. (Mara does a fine job of portraying Claire’s selfishness and delusion, though I found Burdge’s chaotic turn more convincing.)

A Teacher is a sophisticated portrait of a villain, one that uses its 10 episodes to uncover her misdeeds—and throw them into stark relief.