The Big Cigar: Season 1

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Generally favorable reviews based on 19 Critic Reviews

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The Big Cigar

Now Playing: The Big Cigar

Season Details & Credits

Apple TV+ | Season Premiere Date: May 16, 2024

Summary: Wanted by the FBI, Black Panther leader Huey P. Newton (André Holland) gets help from Easy Rider producer Bert Schneider (Alessandro Nivola) to escape to Cuba in the six-episode limited series based on Joshuah Bearman's Playboy article of the same name.

Creator: Jim Hecht

Genre(s): Drama, Movie/Mini-Series, Suspense

Season 1 Episodes

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S1:E6. The Pirate
Air Date: November 30, -0001
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S1:E5. Lost Paradise
Air Date: November 30, -0001
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S1:E4. What Are Friends For?
Air Date: November 30, -0001

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Metascore

Positive:

Mixed:

Negative:

Critic Reviews

Judy Berman

May 16, 2024

The Big Cigar works on multiple levels. It’s a retro action thriller. It’s a fictional representation of American history and the biography of a countercultural giant. It’s a showcase for Nivola, Boone, and especially Holland, who balances Huey’s intelligence, courage, and post-traumatic paranoia. There’s humor in the culture clash between revolutionaries and Hollywood types. Read full review

Richard Roeper

May 16, 2024

“The Big Cigar” makes no claims to be any kind of definitive biopic; it’s simply a well-made and, yes, fictionalized telling of the Hollywood-adjacent chapter in Newton’s life. Read full review

Joel Keller

May 17, 2024

Despite our reservations about the storytelling in The Big Cigar, we were impressed by Holland’s turn as Huey P. Newton. That alone is enough to watch this fast-moving series. Read full review

Brian Lowry

May 17, 2024

What should be an enticing mashup of the civil-rights movement and Hollywood in the freewheeling ‘70s doesn’t entirely ignite, in a limited series whose underlying true story packs more of wallop than the finished product. Read full review

The Observer (UK) Barbara Ellen

Sep 10, 2024

Ultimately, this “mostly true” story would have been a better fit for a film, a la BlacKkKlansman, but Holland is strong as the revolutionary political activist grappling with memories, addictions and trauma. Read full review

The Playlist Brian Tallerico

May 17, 2024

There’s a lot to like on the surface of “The Big Cigar.” It’s just too bad there’s no real fire to go with all this smoke. Read full review

Alan Sepinwall

May 16, 2024

The Big Cigar, unfortunately, seems most interested in Huey the icon, to the point where it all but ignores any details of the murder of which he was accused. (Nor, in the closing titles about what happened to everyone after the events of the series, does it get into the allegations that the Panthers later attempted to murder a witness in the case to prevent her from testifying against Newton.) Such messiness comes across as incidental to the magic-of-the-movies hooey that suffuses The Big Cigar. Read full review

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Seasons & Episodes

61

Series Overview
Season 1

61
- Season 1 Overview
  Air Date: May 16, 2024
- tbd
  S1:E6. The Pirate
  Air Date: November 30, -0001
- tbd
  S1:E5. Lost Paradise
  Air Date: November 30, -0001
- tbd
  S1:E4. What Are Friends For?
  Air Date: November 30, -0001
- tbd
  S1:E3. Guns & Matzah
  Air Date: November 30, -0001
- tbd
  S1:E2. The Cuban
  Air Date: November 30, -0001
- tbd
  S1:E1. Panther / Producer
  Air Date: May 16, 2024