'Black Rabbit' Has an 'Ozark' Problem

For all the comparisons that Ozark drew to Breaking Bad upon its 2017 release (the “hillbilly Breaking Bad”), I always felt its structure was closer to Bloodline, the Kyle Chandler series that ran on Netflix from 2015 to 2017. Ozark picked up where Bloodline left off, with what I like to call panic-attack television.

It’s not just because Ozark was tense or suspenseful (though it often was). It’s because Ozark, Bloodline, and now Black Rabbit pile on the misery. It’s as if the writers of all three series (Zach Baylin and Katie Susman here) are in a contest to see how many corners they can back their characters into. The stress isn’t inflicted with violence so much as with suffocating complications.

There’s no reprieve, which is exactly what makes them addictive binge shows. We don’t keep watching because they’re necessarily great television (though all three series have standout moments and excellent performances). We keep watching because we want relief. We need to get to the end, if only to lift the anvil off our chests and breathe again.

To its credit, Black Rabbit replicates the Bloodline/Ozark formula almost perfectly. Jason Bateman plays Vince Freidkin, a professional screw-up who returns to his New York City hometown after accidentally killing a man during a botched robbery. Back home, Vince turns to his brother Jake (Jude Law) for money, only to discover that their late mother’s house is about to be sold. Vince just has to wait out the closing to collect $150,000.

The problem is, Vince didn’t skip town years earlier without reason. He owed dangerous men $140,000, and when they catch up to him, they demand repayment, or they’ll kill him and his estranged daughter, Gen (Odessa Young).

Jake has his own troubles. He runs The Black Rabbit, the restaurant he and Vince founded years ago. Vince sold his share to bail himself out of an earlier disaster, and even mortgaged their mother’s house to gamble, only to dig himself in deeper. Vince is the kind of guy who doubles down on mistakes until he’s buried alive in rubble.

If Jake were smart, he’d cut ties, but he has a soft spot for his brother, and he’s a mess in his own right. The restaurant is overextended, he’s illegally shuffling money to fund a new venture, his star chef Roxie (Amaka Okafor) is threatening to leave, and he’s romantically entangled with Estelle (Cleopatra Coleman), the decorator who happens to be dating Wes (Sope Dirisu), Jake’s best friend and financial backer.

It’s a disaster that only snowballs, because every scheme the Freidkin brothers devise to escape one trap only lands them in another. The noose tightens until Jake, Vince, and the audience all feel their eyeballs might pop from the strain.

It’s stressful television, and it isn’t enjoyable in a traditional sense, but it’s irresistible once it builds momentum. That’s the model: one obstacle leads to two more, a spiral of dread designed to mimic the experience of crushing debt. Black Rabbit is not for the faint of heart.

Still, it’s worth watching for Jude Law at his sleazy-charming best and Jason Bateman playing (mostly) against type. He’s still recognizably Bateman, but not the straight man. Here, he’s the degenerate, looking like he crawled out of a heroin den. The characters aren’t likable, but the people around them are, and that collateral damage is the hook that keeps us invested.

Ultimately, however, Black Rabbit has an Ozark problem, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t compelling. The show is relentless in its misery, and the grind of watching the Freidkin brothers f**k up can feel punishing. Yet that same intensity is what makes it hard to look away. If Baylin and Susman could only figure out how to puncture the dread with moments of release, Black Rabbit would be more than just another exercise in futility. It could be the rare panic-attack drama that’s as rewarding as it is exhausting. But like Ozark and Bloodline before it, it hasn’t figured out how to release the foot from our neck long enough to actually care about its main characters. Also, Bateman — who also directed Ozark — directed the first two episodes, and it has the same goddamn problem with camera filters. Staahp!