“Grim-Faced Murder Detectives Abroad” is a genre of prestige — or at least prestige-adjacent — television I’ve avoided until now. So too is its auxiliary wing, “American Version of Grim-Faced Murder Detectives Abroad.” Secret City, the new crime drama from Netflix, is a little bit of both. Set in Canberra, Australia, the country where it originally aired in 2016, it’s one of the many many foreign shows branded with the American streaming-media behemoth’s familiar red N. Its star, Fringe‘s Anna Torv, also co-headlines the David Fincher serial-killer series Mindhunter, a hit for the network (as far as anyone knows; Netflix is infamously opaque about such things). Despite predating Mindhunter, this gives Secret City the feel of a side project, a place Torv can use her native accent and look less like Carrie Coon while still dealing with the same basic matters of investigation, intrigue, and murder most foul. If Mindhunter is her Parliament-Funkadelic, Secret City is Bootsy’s Rubber Band.
I reviewed the first episode of Secret City on Netflix for Decider. Based on one episode out of a total of six, it’s a so-so show with a strong lead and at least one interesting supporting character.
Tags: decider, reviews, secret city, TV, TV reviews