Netflix’s The Serpent Manages to Make an Infamous, Brazen Psychopath’s Story Boring

You ever watch a show and just experience a bone-deep weariness because, while it’s not bad and a lazy part of you just wants to keep watching more, you might not even have the willpower or bravery, one year into our pandemic, to reach out with your heavy arm and stop the Netflix “you must watch more!” inertia button. But… it’s also not good enough, and the minutes and hours that slip away are irrecoverable, and instead of sitting alone in this Austin, TX hotel room missing your family, you could be out on the streets eating an authentic chorizo taco and meeting an old musician who knew Willie Nelson and it turns out that’s just the start of his great stories?

Oops. Apologies. Got a little hyper-specific at the end there. Back to The Serpent, which has the good idea of dramatizing the life of the serial killer Charles Sobhraj, a French con artist with a predilection for poisoning, drowning, and burning other human beings, particularly hippies from the western world. He lived an outrageous life that included an opulent 20-year stay in an Indian prison—which he extended an extra 10 years by drugging all the guards and inmates during a “going away party,” walking out of the jail, and getting recaptured intentionally to avoid being executed in Thailand—and now rots in a Nepalese prison because he arrogantly returned to Kathmandu after they set him free. He’s an unbelievable psychopath, and terrific fodder for a miniseries co-produced by BBC and Netflix.

But that miniseries in practice? Ehhh. If you’re considering it, I’d give you the same advice I’d give to an American tourist in 1970 seeking enlightenment in the Buddhist monasteries of southeast Asia. Upon encountering a handsome, charismatic Frenchman who offers you a cup of tea: Move on, amigo. The show is superficially well done, “authentic” (as far as I know) in its various early-’70s aesthetics, and even splices in contemporary footage to heighten the verisimilitude. Part of the problem, though it feels cruel to say, is Billy Howle, the British actor who was very good in Dunkirk and enjoys a strong reputation in the U.K. Here, he’s required to do a Dutch accent as Herman Knippenberg, the diplomat who becomes Sobhraj’s chief pursuer, and the real problem is not the so-so accent, but the fact that he plays virtually every scene on the verge of an emotional breakdown. Sometimes it almost makes sense, and other times he’s having a normal conversation and begins shaking and tearing up and you have no idea what’s happening or why. It’s a tremendously distracting performance, and even as I tried to get into the rest of the narrative—with some success, here and there—Howle would appear again and I’d catch myself thinking, “I can’t do this again.”

Tahar Rahim as Sobhraj, and Jenna Coleman as his lover and lieutenant Monique, are far better. But as riveting as their performances can be, the main feeling is that you wish you could be watching them in a better show. (If that resonates, may I recommend the hidden crime classic The Last Panthers, where Rahim shines.) There is a coldness to the storytelling that is not Rahim or Coleman’s fault, but which catches them in its frigid web anyway, and transforms what could be a captivating dynamic into a slog. It comes down to choices—you can depict Sobhraj as a thrilling antihero or you can depict him as a scumbag, and in 2021 our TV morals are sufficiently relativistic that either one could work. You can’t, however, pick neither, which is what the creators of Serpent opt for, resulting in a flattening that discourages viewer engagement.