“Sirens,” premiering Thursday on Netflix, is an odd kind of a collection, an fascinating mixture of hifalutin concepts, household drama and what could be known as darkish farce.
Set over Labor Day weekend on a Cape Cod island peopled by wealthy people whose style runs to pastels and floral prints, it stars Julianne Moore as Michaela, previously a high-powered lawyer who has on condition that up for marriage to hedge-fund billionaire Peter (Kevin Bacon) and a life devoted to rescuing birds of prey. The queen of all she surveys, she speaks in moony aphorisms, is posing for Vainness Truthful and orchestrating a fundraising gala, amongst minor entertainments.
In the meantime, in Buffalo, we meet Devon (Meghann Fahy) a working-class scorching mess, making her entrance out a police station door, sporting a brief black gown, wanting the more serious for put on. Struggling to take care of her father Bruce (Invoice Camp), recognized with dementia, she goes in the hunt for her sister, Simone (Milly Alcock), who has been working as Michaela’s private assistant. After touring 17 hours — carting, for causes of comedy, the large edible association Simone has despatched in lieu of an precise response to her name for assist, nonetheless sporting her night-in-jail garments — Devon will uncover that her sister has been remodeled: She’s eliminated the matching tattoos they acquired collectively, had a nostril job and presents as one thing just like the Disney model of “Wonderland’s” Alice, minus the curiosity. (“You’re dressed like a doily,” says Devon.) Ingmar Bergman followers will word the meant-to-be-noted crib from “Persona,” underlining Devon’s remark that Simone loses herself in different folks.
Simone, for her half, is delighted that she will get to name Michaela “Kiki,” “which is really a special honor,” and faithfully amplifies Michaela’s mercurial requests to the employees, personified by Felix Solis’ Jose, who hate her. (They keep a textual content chain to joke about her.) For all that she’s loyal to Michaela, and considers her a greatest pal, she’s been hiding each her working-class roots and the truth that she’s been sleeping with Ethan (Glenn Howerton), Peter’s also-rich pal and neighbor.
Ethan (Glenn Howerton), Simone (Milly Alcock) and Devon (Meghann Fahy) throughout a gathering at Michaela’s house.
(Netflix)
Although Michaela worries he could be having an affair, Peter, for his half, comes throughout as an primarily good man, for a hedge fund billionaire. He’s pleasant with the assistance, who labored for him earlier than his marriage to Michaela — there are a primary spouse and grownup youngsters offstage — can prepare dinner for himself and hides away from the pastel folks within the mansion’s tower, the place he strums a guitar and smokes a bit of pot. However room has been left for surprises.
“Sirens” is the sisters’ shared particular code for “SOS,” which appears much less sensible than, you already know, SOS, however ties into the obscure Greek mythological references with which the collection has been adorned — extra suggestive than substantial, I’d say, although it’s attainable that’s my lack of classical training displaying. The home Siri system is known as Zeus. One episode is titled “Persephone,” after the goddess of the useless and queen of the underworld; Simone does certainly say to Michaela, “You are literally a goddess” — she does gown like one, in flimsy, flowing robes — whereas Devon thinks that one thing’s gone useless behind Simone’s eyes, that she’s been zombified: “You’re in a cult.”
It was the sirens’ sweetly singing, after all, that drew sailors to their deaths within the outdated tales, and at one level Michaela appears out over the ocean and muses on the boats of whalers crashing bloodily on the rocks. (She is specific concerning the blood.) There’s, actually, a sailor within the collection, Jordan (Trevor Salter), who captains Ethan’s yacht and whom Devon picks up in a lodge bar, however he’s maybe the least doubtless character within the present to crash into something. And Michaela is attended by a trio of girls (Jenn Lyon as Cloe, Erin Neufer as Lisa and Emily Borromeo as Astrid) who, suggesting the title creatures, communicate in concord and act as one, however they’re extra the embodiment of a notion, a throwaway joke, than lively contributors within the story. Michael Abels’ rating contains a choir of feminine voices, opts for one thing that one would possibly effectively determine as historical Greek music even with no notion of what historical Greek music may need appeared like.
Kevin Bacon performs Peter, a hedge fund billionaire married to Michaela.
(Macall Polay / Netflix)
The core of the collection is the battle between Devon and Michaela for the soul of Simone, although there are ancillary battles that may assist resolve the destiny of the struggle. For a viewer, it’s pure to facet with Devon, who, after locking horns with Michaela, will go undercover on the mansion, dressing based on the home guidelines whereas she pokes round. (There’s the suggestion of a homicide thriller.) Nevertheless scorching a large number she could also be, she isn’t pretentious; she has vitality, boldness and consistency, and no matter she will get unsuitable, she lives on this planet that almost all of us do. (I’m assuming you aren’t a billionaire with a mansion on a cliff, a birdhouse stuffed with raptors and a big employees to are inclined to your wants and whims, however in case you are — thanks for studying!) That isn’t to say that Michaela doesn’t have her troubles — certainly, her neediness, which expresses itself as caretaking, resembles Devon’s. “I take care of everything in my orb,” says Michaela, “big and small, prey and predator.”
I hadn’t recognized once I watched “Sirens” that it was primarily based on a play, the 2011 “Elemeno Pea,” by Molly Smith Metzler, who created the collection as effectively, however I assumed it could be. It had the scent of the stage in the way in which characters — together with Bruce and Ray (Josh Segarra), Devon’s boss and adulterous occasional hookup — saved piling in, together with its farcical accelerations, its last-act revelations and reversals.
At “only” 5 episodes, it stays extra centered than most restricted collection, although the tone shifts a bit; some characters come to look deeper and extra advanced, which is nice on the face of it, but in addition can really feel a bit manufactured. Some bits of enterprise are planted merely to bear sensible fruit later. The ending I discovered half-satisfying, or half-frustrating, from character to character, however there are nice, dedicated performances alongside the way in which, and I used to be way over midway entertained.
