Eric

An unfocused, inconsistently written, and wonderfully acted show whose ambition is admirable and originality rare in an increasingly formulaic crime genre, even if creator Abi Morgan (The Hour) never manages to reconcile its tonal dissonance. What holds it all together, albeit like a plastic bag tearing under the heft of its contents, is the parallel Morgan draws between a world overpopulated with bad dads and a patriarchy—one that, in the city, encompasses the police, real estate, and politics—that is rotting from the inside.

There’s a lot about Eric we didn’t love. But, boy, we loved Benedict Cumberbatch’s performance as the troubled, grieving father of a missing child. It’s so good it might actually paper over most of the show’s flaws.

The series is an ambitious swing, which is in itself a great thing – and if it misses, that makes it no less admirable an attempt.

The acting in the Netflix miniseries “Eric” is knock-down-drag-out good. There’s anger, madness, fear, loss, and grief all over the script, and there’s a set of performers, most notably Benedict Cumberbatch, who are seriously up to the task. Emotion is discharged. It’s all in service of an unwieldy, overstuffed 1980s-set story line that’s too ambitious for its own good, alas — but still, there’s a lot to admire in these six fast-paced episodes.

It is a mystery with a twist, where the twist is more interesting than the mystery. You don’t drink the cocktail for the garnish, but that doesn’t stop it adding some, much needed, zest.

Several times during Eric I asked myself, “If it wasn’t for Benedict Cumberbatch, would you carry on watching this?” The honest answer is no. Without him there would be far less reason to. Abi Morgan’s drama is well written, yes, but I didn’t find the story particularly compelling, hairy blue monster or not.

While there are a lot of individual aspects that are easy to admire, the series is a bit of a mess as a whole, a collection of ideas crammed into six hour-long episodes that Eric tries to wrap up too neatly by the final scene.

That’s a lot of specificity. Too much specificity, one might argue, for a show that wants to tie a fable about paternal regret to an indictment of a broken city. “Eric” is better at the former than the latter, artfully exposing and forgiving human foibles and celebrating the good things strangers can do for (and see within) each other.

“Eric” is painted in harsh and broad strokes, and the cynicism and ugliness is relentless without being particularly insightful.

A meandering treatise on the need to “do better” which fails, at every excruciating turn, to heed its own advice.

In every episode of “Eric,” there’s something that works, usually in the choices made by the ensemble, and one certainly can’t say that about every show on Netflix. To that end, fans of this one’s multi-talented lead should probably check it out. Everyone else might just want to watch “Sesame Street” instead.

“Eric” is filled with enough important issues — and one big hairy quirk — to make it seem like a series filled with fresh, serious ideas. But they’re really just window-dressing around another bad-dad saga that’s too distracted chasing a long shaggy tail.

Morgan ties her yarn in some pretty silly knots to complete the necessary redemption arcs in the finale, which delivers its first of several endings about half an hour into its 52-minute runtime. By then, it's a relief to know the ordeal is almost over.

The series ends up feeling imitative and unsatisfying. It’s flat-pack, prestige-ish television: easy to assemble from familiar narrative pieces, but fundamentally soulless.

“Eric” practically drips with Prestige TV trappings: a cast of great actors, a Very Serious Topic, and no doubt a primo slot coming soon on your Netflix recommendations page. It’s also all over the place as a six-episode series, a genuinely depressing slog through the corruption and general skeeviness of New York City in the 1980s.