Apple TV+’s ‘Dangerous Sisters’ assessment: Sharon Horgan’s darkish comedy ditches whodunnit for the way

What was it about Disaster, the comedy/drama Sharon Horgan co-created with Rob Delaney, that made it so rattling good? The sharp writing? The intelligent mix of genres? The enjoyable story? All these issues performed an element, however it was the characters — in all their flawed, human, amusing glory — that really elevated the present.

Disaster is completed now, however Horgan continues to be busy writing, producing, and appearing, from Aisling Bea’s This Manner Up to Nicolas Cage’s wild experience The Insufferable Weight of Large Expertise. And Dangerous Sisters, a brand new Apple TV+ present created by Horgan, could be her finest work but.

Mixing comedy, drama, and a splash of crime thriller, Dangerous Sisters is predicated on Malin-Sarah Gozin’s Belgian sequence, Clan. The 10-episode sequence tells the story of the Garvey sisters — one in every of whom, Grace (Anne-Marie Duff), is married to a person (Claes Bang) that her household refers to in personal as “The Prick”. This can be a critical understatement. John Paul is a controlling, manipulative, and abusive misogynist, an impressively hateable character who manages to incorrect every of Grace’s sisters in varied disagreeable methods. The household’s answer? Begin planning how they could do away with him for good.

With its coastal setting and story of ladies banding collectively to take down an abusive man, the present’s trailer inevitably prompted comparisons to David E. Kelley’s Large Little Lies. However that comparability solely goes so deep. Structurally, tonally, and even when you drill down into the story itself, the present may be very a lot its personal beast.

Enjoying out over two timelines, Dangerous Sisters begins with the funeral of a now very a lot useless John Paul, following the Garvey sisters as they try to evade the newbie investigation of two determined insurance coverage brokers (performed by Brian Gleeson and Daryl McCormack). Every episode cuts forwards and backwards through flashbacks, slowly revealing how the person’s dying actually got here to go and the messy steps that led to it. Not a whodunnit, however a howdunnit.

The Garvey sisters: Eve Hewson, Sharon Horgan, Anne-Marie Duff, Eva Birthistle, and Sarah Greene. Credit score: Apple TV+

Sound difficult? It does not really feel it. Stepping into I used to be questioning how the present would steadiness its many characters — absolutely a number of the 5 Garvey sisters can be missed, or really feel underdeveloped? Under no circumstances. Every has their very own clear persona, their very own well-drawn motives. Eva (Sharon Horgan) is the de facto chief, the career-focussed large sister with a tough previous; Ursula (Eva Birthistle) is juggling a husband and three children and craving for youthful days; Bibi (Sarah Greene) is a no-nonsense mum coping with her personal anger on the lack of a watch; Becka (Eve Hewson) is the youngest sister, sick of being babied and eager to show herself. Every character is written and carried out with nuance and flexibility, all likeable in their very own methods whereas flawed in others.

The identical consideration to element is proven to the present’s supporting characters, too. Frank of Eire star Gleeson is a sweary, determined mess as insurance coverage agent Thomas Claffin. He spends his time asking slimy questions and stealing rubbish in an try to save lots of his household enterprise, whereas roping in his brother Matthew, a motorbike-riding heartthrob performed by Good Luck to You, Leo Grande star McCormack, whose likelihood assembly with Becka creates its personal thorny facet plot.

Credit score: Apple TV+

Timelines and characters are woven collectively with out power, due to robust writing carried out by administrators Rebecca Gatward, Josephine Bornebusch, and Dearbhla Walsh. Regardless of the very fact we all know the place the flashback scenes are finally headed, there’s nonetheless a horrible quantity of pressure, frustration, and humour within the sisters’ many failed makes an attempt to place an finish to their brother-in-law, in addition to a constructing sense of injustice as we watch John Paul’s smug and sadistic schemes roll out.

So, is there something incorrect with Dangerous Sisters? To be sincere, not likely. I used to be given the primary seven episodes of the 10-episode sequence for assessment and completely raced by means of them, wincing and cringing by means of the varied imaginative homicidal eventualities that play out. Except the sequence, together with John Paul, meets a disappointing finish — and there isn’t any motive to assume that it (or he) will — then Dangerous Sisters is on monitor to be one in every of Apple’s finest reveals thus far.

The primary two episodes of (opens in a brand new tab)Dangerous Sisters(opens in a brand new tab) are streaming on Apple TV+ from Aug. 19(opens in a brand new tab), with new episodes dropping weekly after that.