Maniac: What the reviewers think

BBC Radio 5 Live Afternoon Edition's TV reviewers this week are Boyd Hilton from Heat Magazine and journalist Hayley Campbell. They're sharing their thoughts on Netflix's new series, Maniac.

What did you think? Leave your reviews below...

Hayley says: "It’s hard to figure out what this show is"

“Maniac stars Jonah Hill and Emma Stone, who previously worked together in the film ‘Superbad’. It’s about medical trials. These two characters meet in this experimental medical trial – they both have miserable life reasons for signing up. 

"It’s a very weird show. It’s directed by Cary Fukunaga who did the first series of True Detective. While it does bill itself as a sci-fi show, it’s strange and odd in the way that True Detective was a detective show but was also strange and odd.

“It’s got a lot of good ideas in it. It’s hard to figure out what this show is.

“I really like the design of it. It’s futuristic in a kind of nostalgic way, in an 80s or 90s way – the phones are still analogue, the TVs are still bad. It’s kind of comforting in that – it’s a world you don’t know, but you go ‘oh, I know what happens here.’”

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Boyd says: "I really loved it, but it is challenging"

“There has to be a public service explanation for this show because it is almost deliberately difficult to start with.

"For the first couple of episodes where it introduces these troubled characters and you see them going to the facility, it doesn’t really nail down the actual premise of the show, which is that we actually see these two people going to all kinds of weird and wonderful places, in imaginary flights of fantasy, which is how this pill that they’re testing works.

"That doesn’t happen properly until episode four. In the end it’s worth it.

“By about episode four, I really loved it, but it is challenging. Even if you think, ‘what the hell is going on’ there are enough really good moments to stick with it.

“You couldn’t get away with it on normal, linear television. It’s definitely a show tailored to the Netflix viewer.

“One of the people involved told me they did research that shows if you sit down to binge on a show, you’ll give it two episodes. If you’re watching a show on prime-time BBC One, people don’t give it two minutes and will start slating it on Twitter. I think they wouldn’t even attempt this on a normal, linear TV show.”

Maniac is available on Netflix from Friday 21st September.

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