Furious is well named. It is powered throughout its eight-episode run by an unfaltering current of female rage. It is the creation of Elizabeth Meriwether, who gave us last year’s astonishing Dying for Sex (starring Michelle Williams as a woman with terminal cancer discovering the range and depth of her sexuality for the first time) and 2022’s brisk, brilliant The Dropout (the tale of Elizabeth Holmes, the disgraced founder of blood-testing company, Theranos). They were both based on true stories. Furious was apparently inspired by the 1987 film Black Widow, starring Theresa Russell and Debra Winger, but it has jettisoned the marry-and-murder-for-money plot and contemporised the rest so thoroughly that the result hardly seems to merit the dutiful hat-tip the publicity has given it.
Meriwether is the writer of the first three episodes, the rest are divided among four women and one man. The drama itself is dominated by three complicated and fascinating female characters, played by Emmy Rossum, Lola Petticrew (who gave an extraordinary performance in 2024’s Say Nothing) and Quincy Tyler Bernstine. A fantastic supporting cast and a dense, lean, evocative script make this television for grownups, television to pay attention to and to entertain you enormously.
