Perry Mason (2020)

After three long pandemic years, the brilliant Matthew Rhys returns to his series role as a legal eagle now embroiled in a haunting and hypnotic 1930s plot that resembles the film noir classic Chinatown. Yup, it’s that good. Perry, it's great to have you back where you belong.

Season 2 — which also features notable supporting performances from Hope Davis, Katherine Waterston, a returning Shea Whigham, and others — also confirms the sense that the first season was effectively eight episodes of winding up. With these episodes Perry Mason really gets going.

Season 2 is an elegant, arresting noir that’s hard to shake and sly enough to savor. Part of this adaptation’s appeal is how it balances the past and the present.

When we see where Mason ends up and how he must contemplate this truth alone, it almost feels like Season 2's finale could be a series ender. One hopes it isn’t, as Perry Mason has really found its footing, but it still provides a poetic sense of closure all the same.

Knottily complex storytelling, replete with plot twists and moral nuance, was an improvement on the uneven debut run. Themes of racial and sexual prejudice arose naturally from the narrative, rather than feeling tacked-on for 21st century relevance. ... Perry Mason is an underrated treat.

Perry Mason’s second season finally puts both pieces together, and it is a gavel-banging good time.

HBO’s dark revisionist version of Perry Mason didn’t reach its top tier of dramas in the first season but comes considerably closer in the second, achieving a film-noir-ish cool that leans deeply into “L.A. Confidential” territory. Filtering race, sexuality and the corrupting influence of wealth through a 1930s lens, the series feels more relevant and compelling as a glimpse of the present through that past.

Season 2 is a far stronger season than the first, with the show never straying from its examination of how power and money corrupt the pursuit of pure and true justice. The only area where Season 1 has Season 2 beat is maybe in the storytelling.

The season two plot, courtesy of new showrunners Jack Amiel and Michael Begler (“The Knick”), is less convoluted but still occasionally overly languid. “Perry Mason” remains at its best when the focus is on the series regulars and their relationships.

The new “Perry Mason” seems to have finally found its footing. Even when the storytelling starts to meander, the ensemble cast—filled with heavy hitters from film, TV, and stage—manage to keep the plates in the air.

The new season is still more dour than it probably needs to be, but it’s more solidly crafted and entertaining on the whole, and no longer feels like a cynical attempt to exploit a familiar title for an audience too young to know or care about the substance of it.

While the show’s languid pace in the first few episodes might test your patience, prepare to get drawn in as this hot-potato case reflects the tenor and the racism of the times, and is far more gnarly than originally thought.

Elegantly grizzled as the show may be, I actually appreciate the rare moments of earnestness.

The season-long case is tighter, even while it’s not quite rich enough to supply a charge to all eight episodes.

We hope that Season 2 of Perry Mason comes together in subsequent episodes, because the first episode was a bit all over the place trying to establish where all of the characters are this season.

His redemption arc was compelling, but heavy-handed storytelling lets him down in Perry Mason's disappointing second season. [13 - 26 Mar 2023, p.4]

Perry Mason’s second season may be watchable, but it’s so much louder about saying so much less.