(TV SERIES) Mr. & Mrs. Smith - An Action-Comedy Drama Series Inspired by the Successful 2005 Movie

I was quite surprised when I found out that this new series had all of its episodes released on the same day. Usually Prime Video would release two episodes on its first week and the rest would be shown every week after. So I immediately gave it a try during the weekend and managed to finish it easily. All right, I'll get more to it then.

Brief Story Line

Two strangers who would use the pseudonym of John Smith (Donald Glover - Solo: A Star Wars Story, Spider-man: Homecoming etc) and Jane (Maya Erskine - PEN15 TV series, Blue Eye Samurai animated series etc) were recruited by unknown organization to work on various covert assignments from simple deliveries to dangerous stuff like protecting high value target. For their cover, they lived together as husband and wife.

What started as casual professional relationship would soon develop into something deeper and would forever change their lives.

So how would the story conclude? You could find out in this series.

End of Brief Story Line

When the 2005 movie of the same title was released, somehow I did not get to see it in the cinema. But I did watch it sometime later via cable TV. I remember thinking the movie was entertaining with plenty of nice actions. But the unique story was something that I thought was the main attraction as this married couple were secretly assassins (without the spouse knowing about it) and were later trying to kill each other. Anyway, I was interested in this series as I wanted to see how it would be like when the story was told in a serialized format.

At first, I thought the story was going in a rather slow pace (aside from the exciting early part). When John and Jane were working on their first assignment while trying to know a bit about the other, the story became more fun. But I really liked the ending of the pilot episode as it was a wonderful start to make me feel curious on the subsequent episodes. In the second episode though, I felt the assignment was still a bit light and did not exactly provide me with real thrill. I found that after watching the whole season, this series had its ups and downs. It's like every time I thought a cool episode was shown, it would continue with a slow episode. I would have loved it if every episode would increase its intensity and got better as it progressed. Of all the 8 episodes, I liked the finale the best and the fifth episode a close second with its lovely scenery and suspense. 

Btw, the series was labeled as spy-comedy-drama on the internet which was probably best categorized cause they work like spies and the dark comedy was strongly felt. Sometimes I thought the comedy and drama outshone the action, but it was not the kind of humor where you would laugh out loud. I also felt the story focused a bit more on the relationship between Mr. and Mrs. Smith as they lived together for some time, working on assignments together and became like real life married couple (which was why the 6th episode became quite funny). Obviously the lead cast Donald Glover and Maya Eskrine were also convincing in their roles, making them a joy to watch.

Aside from those two, there were plenty of additional cast who were pretty well known. We got names like Paul Dano (The Guilty etc) as the Smiths' neighbor, John Turturro (The Batman etc), Billy Campbell (The Rocketeer etc), Ron Perlman (Ron Perlman etc), Parker Posey (Lost in Space TV series), Sarah Paulson (Run etc) and few others. There were even brief appearances of Alexander Skarsgård (Godzilla vs. Kong etc), Eiza González (Ambulance etc) and Úrsula Corberó (Money Heist series etc). So the series managed to attract these people to guest star which said a lot about the power of the producers. I noticed that Donald Glover was one of the executive producers with Francesca Sloane and several others. Both of them were credited as the creators of the series. 

Overall this was still a unique series that understandably was well received by critics who were charmed by the lead cast and their chemistry. The couple's dynamic was quite fun, the notable guest stars certainly added the exciting element and the mysterious organization was intriguing too. But for me personally, the lack of spectacular actions like in the movie and the cliffhanger ending was a bit downside, especially if it is not renewed for a new season (cause by the time I wrote the post, not sure if there is going to be second season). It would have probably been more impressive for me if the action was shown more instead of just like background (except for the finale). So if you are fans of the movie, you might consider this a refreshing remake (or spin off set in the same universe?). But if you are like me who wanted to see wonderful action series, then you might need to manage your expectation.

Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars