You notice its cinematic qualities in the first episode of “The Essex Serpent,” a series debuting with two installments this week on Apple TV+.
It’s deeper into the six-episode adaptation of Sarah Perry’s 2016 novel of the same name that it hits you: This may have been better as a movie.
A work of British Australian production house See-Films, “The Essex Serpent” stars longtime “Homeland” fixture Claire Danes and Loki himself, Tom Hiddleston, with “Fear the Walking Dead” alum Frank Dillane in a significant role, as well. It is set late in the 19th century in Perry’s native Essex, where, yes, a large, otherworldly serpent is suspected of being responsible for terrible things befalling a small village characterized by marshes and other attractive landscapes.
