- Network: HULU
- Series Premiere Date: Nov 22, 2022
Critic Reviews
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Running at eight episodes, Welcome to Chippendales is overlong, and too often the pace sags like a sweat-soaked loincloth. Still, it remains an interesting watch, with a sparky soundtrack (Donna Summer; Wire; the Sweet).
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The sleaze, glamour and general air of excess that hung about the 80s is nicely captured, and all eight episodes can be easily binged. But you do long for some depth, some nuance, and perhaps an actor less fundamentally gentle than Kumail Nanjiani, who might have captured more convincingly the darkness lurking in Banerjee’s soul.
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Kumail Nanjiani seems unsure whether to play Bannerjee as hero or villain, and his switch from endearing to raging control freak is abrupt. The script is entertaining, however.
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The truncated timeline of events sometimes works against the series, but vibrant performances make for emotionally investing viewing.
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Hulu has carved out an impressive niche of salacious fact-based limited series, including several with a true-crime hook. “Welcome to Chippendales” checks off those boxes, but in a less-appealing package that’s surprisingly lifeless, and even with its trashy selling points looks under-dressed for success.
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The result is an ideas-rich but disjointed series that feels like it’s tackling too much, yet somehow hardly enough, with a protagonist whose motivations are subject to whatever wild happenstance the scripts are setting up next.
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There’s an interesting crime story entangled in the story of Chippendales. ... But the problem is that the show has that true-crime plot as a backbone, but no pulse or libido. A show called “Welcome to Chippendales” shouldn’t forgo opportunities to dazzle or charm us; instead, just like the drinks Irene serves, this tale feels watered-down.
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If you want to get a more complete picture of how Chppendales exploded in popularity and how Banerjee’s poor decisions led to his death, watch Curse Of The Chippendales or any of the other docuseries about the club’s history. Welcome To Chippendales is so over-fictionalized that it actually makes the story less compelling than the real thing.
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Over eight 45ish minute installments, the miniseries never quite works its way to a distinctive tone or style or perspective, and never finds all that much to say about what it’s showing us beyond some vague clichés about greed, pride and the immigrant experience. ... There’s a difference between buying the right stuff, and knowing what to do with it. Welcome to Chippendales, sadly, doesn’t know what to do with it.
User score distribution:
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Positive: 6 out of 13
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Mixed: 2 out of 13
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Negative: 5 out of 13
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Dec 3, 2022Kumail Nanjiani's acting is bad, he should stick to comedy. His bad performance hinders the series to become more of a mediocre shallow comedy
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Dec 1, 2022