I’ve written that Sugar is a fantasy of a frictionless, trafficless Los Angeles, in which our angelic alien glides from destination to destination, easily earning the trust of people from across the town’s tapestry of cultures. It enhances the show’s dreamy tone, sure. But does the fact that John Sugar is, for all intents and purposes, a rich white man in a suit influence his ability to do what he does so effortlessly? The other explanations — highly stylized writing, or as-yet undisclosed alien pheromones — are satisfying, but they don’t make for a particularly rich text.
What has always distinguished Sugar is the off-kilter excellence of its execution. In some senses that’s still there: the photography of Los Angeles, whether at night or in broad daylight, remains absolutely beautiful, and so does the photography of Colin Farrell.
But the wheels are really starting to creak everywhere else. The sequence in which Sugar walks through the EZ4’s base of operations is frankly an embarrassment, a series of glowering tattooed Mexicans with white socks pulled up high, mean-mugging the only white person on the screen. To paraphrase Community, I can excuse racism, but I draw the line at a boring walk through a yard controlled by drug dealers when The Wire did this for season after season without ever once being dull about it twenty damn years ago.
I reviewed this week’s disappointing Sugar for Decider.
Tags: decider, sugar, TV, TV reviews