Black Sails
Starz | Release Date: January 25, 2014
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
59
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 33 Critic Reviews
Positive:
17
Mixed:
14
Negative:
2
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
60
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteRob OwenJan 24, 2014
Season 1 Review: Through its first two hours, Black Sails is entertaining enough but not nearly as addictive as "Spartacus" came to be through its first season; perhaps in time that will change. Read full review
50
We Got This CoveredEdward LoveJan 23, 2017
Season 4 Review: Black Sails plays more like a courtroom drama than a jaunt on the high seas. It’s maddeningly earnest, stripped bare of personality and stuffed with dialogue that falls flat. Read full review
50
The Lincoln Journal StarJeff KorbelikMar 27, 2014
Season 1 Review: The drama is nothing more than a video game, with a story secondary to the blood and sex. Read full review
50
Philadelphia InquirerDavid HiltbrandJan 27, 2014
Season 1 Review: The scenery, the spectacle, the set design, the costuming, and the camera work are all winning, but the pacing of the series (which is planned for a second 10-episode season) is nettlesomely slow. Read full review
50
TV Guide MagazineMatt RoushJan 24, 2014
Season 1 Review: Black Sails opens promisingly enough with a sea battle, followed by threats of violent upheaval aboard the Walrus, captained by the arrogant, aloof Flint (Toby Stephens). Too soon, though, the action moves onto land. And while Starz staples like graphic sex and savagery are hardly uncommon occurrences in the bustling debauchery of New Providence Island, Sails becomes stubbornly becalmed by its landlocked third and fourth hours, as tiresome wheeling and dealing triggers a bout of Restless Sea Legs Syndrome in the impatient viewer. Read full review
50
Denver PostJoanne OstrowJan 24, 2014
Season 1 Review: The cast is stunning, the music enticing. Yet Black Sails lands too quickly on an island (shot in Cape Town) and the best parts of the spectacle--the open sea vistas and the claustrophobic shipboard scenes--run aground. Read full review
50
The New York TimesMike HaleJan 23, 2014
Season 1 Review: Much of the time in the early episodes is spent on the preparations for this mission [for one last big score] and on laying out a complicated network of alliances and animosities, and it gets to be a slog. Helping to keep us interested are Mark Ryan, providing a comic touch as a grizzled quartermaster, and Luke Arnold as a not-so-charming rogue named John Silver, not yet Long. Read full review
50
HitfixAlan SepinwallJan 23, 2014
Season 1 Review: Like most of [Starz's] shows, though, it's all flash and no substance, and the flash fades pretty quickly, no doubt right around the point the production accountant realized just how much it costs to film extended sequences with ships in water. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubEmily VanDerWerffJan 23, 2014
Season 1 Review: Black Sails is a handsome illusion at times, but it rarely finds its way beyond that. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleDavid WiegandJan 22, 2014
Season 1 Review: [Viewers] figure there will be sex and nudity, blood and violence. Black Sails has most of that, but there isn't enough action in the first four episodes. If you give us a pirate series, we want to see ships going at it on the high seas. Read full review
42
Washington PostHank StueverJan 7, 2014
Season 1 Review: At times Black Sails feels like it wants to be taken seriously as a complicated, premium cable drama (a la “Game of Thrones”). At other times, it feels more like cheesier, more niche material (a la “Spartacus”). Read full review
40
New York Magazine (Vulture)Margaret LyonsJan 24, 2014
Season 1 Review: Black Sails is rigidly unspectacular, and it comes at the worst possible time for a show like this not to be very good. Read full review
40
VarietyBrian LowryJan 23, 2014
Season 1 Review: This South Africa-lensed production might tempt adventure-seeking viewers to plunge into its crystal-blue waters, but despite some handsome aspects, the show ultimately proves as hollow as its CGI-rendered ships. Read full review
40
Kansas City StarSara SmithJan 17, 2014
Season 1 Review: Black Sails is exactly like the 18th-century Caribbean pirates it brings to life: dirty, amoral and worth stomaching only when there are no women around. Read full review
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