Your Weekend Binge Watch: The Boroughs

Your Weekend Binge Watch: The Boroughs

Available to watch on Netflix; 1 season, 8 episodes, 40 min.-1 hour each; Science fiction

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Watch The Boroughs for an addictively good time. Come for the fact that it’s executive produced by the Duffer Brothers of Stranger Things fame, but stay for the incredible cast, wild premise, and great, grounded acting.

Synopsis

In a seemingly picturesque retirement community, a group of unlikely heroes must band together to stop an otherworldly threat from stealing the one thing they don’t have: time.

 Thoughts

I cannot stress enough just how much I LOVED The Boroughs, which should be obvious since I’m recommending it here, but having recently finished all of season 1 this past week, it has been the unexpected darling of my summertime binge watches.

I don’t know that I was necessarily the target audience for the show since it’s about an older group of people solving a science fiction mystery in a retirement community (named The Boroughs, which is where the show title comes from), but as a Book Club-loving diehard, maybe I actually am exactly the audience this show is for? I don’t know, but either way, I spent equal time on the edge of my seat wondering what would happen next as I did holding in laughter at the cast not today, Satan-ing all the shenanigans, corporate speak/branding, and obstacles put in their way.

Although this falls neatly under the genre of science fiction, it is also a show about love, loss, grief, and how what we decide to do with the time we have left can dictate the quality of that time. There’s a variety of characters and relationships that inhabit The Boroughs universe that makes this show have something for pretty much everyone… except maybe kids…this isn’t really a kids’ show.

Every episode of the 8 episode season is under an hour, which makes it extremely difficult to turn off. There were a couple nights where I had to put a firm foot down and not “just one more episode” it.

Episode one offers just enough setup and cliffhanger to hook you, and with a cast of lovable and sometimes curmudgeonly heavy-hitters, it’s impossible to not want to know what becomes of their fates. Alfred Molina leads the cast as a grieving widower new to The Boroughs who quickly becomes friends with a rag-tag group of cul-de-sac neighbors played by Bill Pullman, Alfre Woodard, Clarke Peters, Denis O’Hare, and Geena Davis. Other cast members include Carlos Miranda as a new-to-the-Boroughs security guard, as well as Jena Malone as Molina’s daughter, and Seth Numrich and Alice Kremelberg as Blaine and Anneliese Shaw, the something’s not-quite-right owners of The Boroughs.

The Boroughs has not been renewed for a season 2, but don’t let that deter you because although there could be a season 2, there’s not some major, disappointing, never-to-be-answered cliffhanger at the end of season 1. Without giving away any spoilers, the show does a really nice job of tying things together in a satisfying way (even though I’ll never be satisfied because I loved this show so much, and I WANT MORE SEASONS).

The Boroughs is my surprise summer darling binge watch, and I truly hope you watch and enjoy it. I was absolutely hooked after episode 1 and only got more invested as I watched more episodes, which, yes I know, logically makes sense, but my point is that I didn’t feel lulls or apathy at any point in the show’s 8 episode arc. My biggest complaint is that it hasn’t been renewed! The Boroughs. Totally BingeReady.