If you like the work of Stephen King and police series with the tone of True Detective, you've come to the right place: The Outsider is your kind of series and with only one season it has the advantage that you can start it and finish it in one weekend.

The plot centers on the investigation of the gruesome murder of a child in a town in Oklahoma that shocks the entire community. A crime for which there seems to be an obvious culprit. Faced with the strength of the evidence, police detective Ralph Anderson arrests baseball coach and teacher Terry Maitland in front of a crowd of spectators, accusing him of killing and mutilating the 11-year-old boy.

However, after the culprit is identified by several witnesses and the preliminary evidence leaves no room for doubt about the identity of the killer, the case takes an inexplicable turn that will test the logic of the investigation.

To help solve the mystery, the child's parents hire an unorthodox private investigator, Holly Gibney (Cynthia Erivo, Genius), a character also featured in Bill Hodges' trilogy (Mr. Mercedes, Finders Keepers, and End of Watch).

In front of and behind the camera

Alongside Mendelsohn, Bateman, and Erivo, the cast of actors includes Julianne Nicholson (Mare of Easttown), Mare Winningham (American Horror Story), Paddy Considine (House of the Dragon), Jeremy Bobb (Russian Doll), and Max Beesley (Operation Fortune).

The adaptation of the horror novel published in 2018 has been led by Richard Price, an Oscar nominee for The Color of Money, and a screenwriter for series like The Wire, The Deuce, and The Night Of, for which he was Emmy-nominated.

In addition to playing the suspect, Jason Bateman, Emmy winner for best director for Ozark, also directs the first two episodes.

With a steady hand, he demonstrates here a very understated style that avoids dwelling on the most visceral reactions of pain, while unashamedly stopping at the most gruesome images. A difficult balance that has a magnificent result: you can't stop looking even if you want to.

Why you should watch it

The Outsider is a series that captures the viewer from the first episode with the magnificent performances of its actors, its unhealthy and unsettling atmosphere, and also because of the nature of its mystery, which introduces a twist from a question that lacks an apparent answer, generating intrigue and the need to stay glued to the screen until the end.

*This article has been automatically translated using artificial intelligence