Black Rabbit landed on Netflix this year and I had no clue but as usually from been online seen reviews start to pop out I had to watch, there was too much noise around it but its not my type of release method since I prefer the more traditional one episode a week, from the jump it is all anxiety and raw family drama but A LOT of anxiety because this guys get in the worst problems you can imagine but honestly its some crazy brother love, it is like a fkn weeklong headache that never ends and seem thirsty for the worst problem possible you could imagine and everytime they kinda hitting rock bottom it just seems like they manage to come up with a crazier idea, one of those shows that keeps you on the edge and sometimes you kinda wish you could step out for air but then the next scene drags you right back in. The whole thing spins around two brothers in New York, Jake played by Jude Law, looking stressed like he is five bills behind on rent and Vince played by Jason Bateman, in full professional screw up mode, they run a restaurant called the Black Rabbit, sounds cool, looks cool but Trust me the only thing chill in there is the food and even that is usually surrounded by drama, booze, drugs and straight up chaos.
- IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt23055142
- Platform: NETFLIX
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So these brothers do have a history, supposed to be close, even used to be in a band together and now Jake tries so damn hard to keep things put together but when Vince stumbles back into his life, dragging debts, mob trouble and all types of bad luck, at first it even looks Jake is in rehabilitation but his drug is his brother and he just wants to stay away from him as far as possible but once after the first hit its over for him, it is like someone opened the door to every bit of trouble you can have in New York, all at once. Vince is the kind of guy you root for until he pisses it all away, cool guy, brilliant but in the very bad way, runs a scam, gets beat up, then falls under eight more problems before payday, I mean Jason Bateman does that broken willpower thing so well, you wonder if the guy even knows what peace feels like or if he even want it. Jake on the other hand, is kinda the glue, got the business, got a kid, tries to keep everybody happy but deep down he is just as lost, obsessed with keeping his brother safe, even if it costs him every damn thing he built, makes you want to shout “bro step off save yourself” but you know he wont.
Now the city itself is a character and I really like that, this is the ugliest, grimiest New York they could come up with, I am talking about sticky floors, never enough light and it all just looks like you can smell the old beer through the screen, specially when everyone is at the Black Rabbit, they nailed the vibe, after they start to tell and show others people experience in that restaurant the only good thing about it is the food because everything else is like opening a different door to hell every night with the worst possible outcome until they start getting very close to death itself. The Black Rabbit is like some twisted symbol, what started as a dream for these guys becomes a trouble magnet, one disaster after another, you wind up seeing these two just circle each other, each episode feeling heavier, more mistakes, more people getting hurt, more chances for everything to blow up, to be honest at times I had to pause and walk away, it got that thick. The show does not mess around with side stories much, lot of the supporting cast are just gas on the fire, everyone brings some extra trouble, Roxy the chef is tough as nails but no one listens to her, Estelle is there to mess with everybody’s head, then you got Wes, Tony and that sad line of investors and goons who would rather burn the place down than step foot in your living room, most of them give “bad news walking” vibes and it totally works. You want to see some of them lose and others just get a break, but the writers do not hand out wins for free, hell no, even the so called good guys got their own nasty backstory, every person you think is going to do the right thing finds a way to mess it up and the funniest part is that they all started together from the ground up, they had nothing and the Rabbit was a haunted house until the dream came true and everyone flourish together.
Probably the biggest gut punch is how the show leans into the dark side of family, you want to think Jake is holding it together for his people but dude keeps gambling with lives not just money and Vince always thinking he is one step away from fixing everything, always a step away from a clean start but always tripping right into another pile of crap. Now not everything is good but when you put in a balance is more good than bad but its like you swap the restaurant for a rundown car, you got the plot of a million dollar hustle gone wrong. Even worse is how they handle trauma, like who gets to forgive who and why, and no one ever comes out clean. The show drags you through dead ends, betrayals, ugly fights, messed up friendships and the kind of payback that ends up hurting more people than it helps, sometimes I wanted to smack both brothers for how damn blind they are. There some heavy stuff too, domestic stuff, stuff with the mob, drugs, even the way the show handles Anna and her story when she gets rapped and nobody knew about it, they did a good job at hidding it from the start, it is rough, not for the weak stomach and honestly it made me mad more than once seeing how little justice comes out by the end. Still you do get these crazy moments of humor from nowhere, like grown men getting chewed out in the kitchen or the chaos of a party where everyone is one drink away from trashing the place, the show has that odd mean streak that makes you laugh right before you get hit with another mess. It is not just “bad things happen,” it is the bad choices make everything worse and the world does not care if you are crying or winning, that is what Black Rabbit really says underneath the dirty dishes and empty bottles.
The ending is a very shocking one that I honeslty didnt expect, you got family dead, careers gone and the only people left are more broken than they started and they did such a great job at keeping in secret how it all started but the last two episodes put up like commercial breaks of all this in between all the chaos, Vince plan was not stick around for his lesson, takes the fast exit and Jake kind of floats back to bartending, which is pretty much his way of starting over on a very basic plan, AA for everyone, start over, maybe learn something this time, keep it simple and minimalism. As I mention the series drags hard sometimes but probably for the first half only until things start to get saucy specially after Vince loose AGAIN!!! more than he owe the mob, sometimes the pacing will bust your brain, a few storylines could have been tighter, but the acting is on point, the city feels like jail and the stress is real, no way could you call it a comfort binge but if you like your drama with a good push of “damn how could it go more wrong,” this is your kind of show. Solid 7.5/10 for me, a series that I would recommed to anyone.
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