|
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION | ||
|
Positive:
23
Mixed:
2
Negative:
0
|
Watch Now
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|
Critic Reviews
Feb 7, 2022
Season 1 Review:
The series is outstanding enough for how it contextualizes Cosby’s legacy, especially for Black America, and the charges against him, which Cosby denies. ... But [W. Kamau Bell] also has a sharp critic’s eye as a performer himself. ... It’s in bringing the two sides together that “We Need to Talk About Cosby” does something too rare in cases like this. It holds Cosby’s achievements and his wrongs close, and it recognizes that there may be unresolvable dissonance between the two.
Read full review
The PlaylistJan 28, 2022
Season 1 Review:
“We Need to Talk About Cosby” justifies the length because of Bell’s intellectual curiosity and journalistic thoroughness – he’s gonna grapple with all of it because it’s complicated. And while he’s covering a lot of territory, it never feels scattershot or unfocused.
Read full review
ColliderJan 24, 2022
Season 1 Review:
We Need to Talk About Cosby is a fascinating look at the life of Cosby, the duality of his career, and the immense letdown of being disappointed by “American’s dad.” But it’s also an integral series in terms of allowing the survivors to tell their own stories, coming to grips with how to explore art from individuals with horrendous pasts, and how it’s important to walk the walk, instead of just talking the talk.
Read full review
Jan 27, 2022
Season 1 Review:
We Need To Talk About Cosby does not attempt to provide a definitive response, but it nonetheless deals sensitively with the whole messy issue. It acknowledges the many ways Cosby’s work positively impacted so many lives, while never taking its eyes off of the lives he irreparably scarred along the way.
Read full review
The Daily BeastJan 24, 2022
Season 1 Review:
The series is a comprehensive, harrowing, and exhaustive look at Cosby’s rise in the entertainment industry, his strategic self-branding throughout the decades of his career, and the unimpeachable impact he had in changing Black culture and how Black Americans are viewed in this country. ... The series also painstakingly builds the other pillar of Cosby’s legacy, brick by haunting brick: the graphic detail of the dozens of assaults alleged by his survivors.
Read full review
Jan 24, 2022
Season 1 Review:
However repetitious We Need to Talk About Cosby occasionally is and however much Cosby’s abrupt release in 2021 left Bell with a more uncertain conclusion for his documentary, this conversation feels like a defining one in our era where questions of separating the art from the artist — Can we? Should we? How do we? — keep coming up. Bell isn’t mealy-mouthed in his harshness or in admitting to his unease when he feels inclined to offer praise or even respect. It’s provocative and important stuff.
Read full review
RogerEbert.comJan 24, 2022
Season 1 Review:
One of his best decisions, and what really elevates the series, is how cleverly he eschews the “fall from grace” structure. ... We don’t just need to talk about Cosby, we need to hear about Cosby, and hearing what he did from the mouths of the people he did it to has incredible power.
Read full review
The TimesMar 7, 2023
iMar 6, 2023
Season 1 Review:
Bell has created a space in which multiple voices and opinions co-exist (even within the same person) without being prescriptive about how his audience should feel. We Need to Talk about Cosby is by no means the final word in a chilling and challenging conversation that will and should continue.
Read full review
Jan 27, 2022
Movie NationJan 31, 2022
Season 1 Review:
By generously sampling Cosby’s greatest hits, by praising Cosby’s philanthropy, Bell masterfully builds us up in between damning indictments. He reminds us of the “monument to Black excellence” that was “The Cosby Show,” its cast and even its set, and of Cosby’s place at the center of American culture. Remembering how high the man rose, how trusted he and his “brand” became makes his fall more disheartening, the reluctance to believe his accusers and the whispers easier to understand.
Read full review
Feb 21, 2022
Season 1 Review:
Bell’s series falls short of questioning the systems of paternalism that endowed a serial rapist with so much institutional control. Sometimes its Black American audience is rendered as an impressionable bloc, pinging between the conspiracies of white supremacy and that of Black respectability politics. ... “We Need to Talk About Cosby” is most compelling as an honest self-reflection of Bell himself, both as an artist and as a Black man invested in the betterment of his people.
Read full review
Jan 28, 2022
Season 1 Review:
It’s a multi-episode conversation that’s thoughtfully and sensitively handled, and rightly places emphasis on how Cosby’s downfall has affected the Black community. It is also transparent about how conflicted Bell and others remain when it comes to how to define this comedian, a feeling that ultimately interferes with the series reaching the strong conclusion it seems to be setting up.
Read full review
The TelegraphJan 27, 2022
Season 1 Review:
We Need To Talk About Cosby deserves praise for holding the comedian to account. But that credit must in the first instance go to the women who spoke out and who are interviewed on camera. Bell, however, wants to tell a story that is bigger than Cosby. And the film he has made feels at once excessive and lacking focus.
Read full review
Current TV Shows
By MetascoreBy User Score