So first things first: it IS too slow, and any other director would have told the same story in less than half the time. On the other hand, that is its greatest strength, too, in that it builds up an unbearable tension I don't think I've seen on the small screen before, with a mood pitched somewhere between Drive (or The Neon Demon), No Country For Old Men, and the darkest moments of Breaking Bad.
It has a horrific - I mean a Passion-Of-The-Christ-like horrific - level of violence in it, that will leave you feeling bleak and hollow, but also (hopefully) dwelling on the emptiness and futility of revenge. It's intentionally ugly and brutal, but impeccably acted and with maybe the best photography ever seen on TV, too.
Am deducting a star because of the shoehorned-in Hollywood politics ('the future is female!/kill all men!') ending, which has no meaning or point in relation to the rest of the story, and I find myself wondering if Refn was obligated to add it in order to get away with all the amoral brutality preceding it.
It has a horrific - I mean a Passion-Of-The-Christ-like horrific - level of violence in it, that will leave you feeling bleak and hollow, but also (hopefully) dwelling on the emptiness and futility of revenge. It's intentionally ugly and brutal, but impeccably acted and with maybe the best photography ever seen on TV, too.
Am deducting a star because of the shoehorned-in Hollywood politics ('the future is female!/kill all men!') ending, which has no meaning or point in relation to the rest of the story, and I find myself wondering if Refn was obligated to add it in order to get away with all the amoral brutality preceding it.