Official Trailer:

 3 seasons and 30 episodes – while it is a slow burn you get hooked from the first episode thanks to Stephen King’s writing, visualization, and excellent performances by actors. Of course, we all know Stephen King is a great storyteller. He is in full throttle here. One can argue he has done better than this but the threads he explored in the third season is thought provoking. This is one of the rare series where follow-on seasons got better. My favorite best is the third season. It takes a different route than the first two but wonderfully links back to the earlier storyline.

First season follows the cat and mouse detective-killer template. Killer taunting the detective – dusted and tested approach. Character arcs, storytelling, dialogues, and unpredictability elevates the mood of the crime thriller. First episode opens with the crime scene – killer, Brady Hartsfield played by Harry Treadaway drives a Mercedes sedan at a job fair running over and killing around 16 people. The case remains unsolved. It becomes the famous Mr. Mercedes killer. Then it jumps ahead 2 years – we see the retired detective, Bill Hodges played by Brendan Gleeson, drowning himself in alcohol – unable to come out of it. Brady hacks Bill’s computer system and start sending taunting messages and videos. New characters get introduced and we get the back stories. The cat and mouse game leads to brutal climax. Brady ends up in coma.

Second season, Stephen King unleashes his super-natural gifts giving it a science foundation 😀 A new drug tested on animals seem to work on neural pathways bringing back functionality. But yet to be tried on humans. Enter greedy pharma corporates and surgeons, they try the new drug on Brady in secrecy. It impacts the patient in unpredictable ways. If you can skip the logic and buy into this premise you are in for a gruesome thriller ride. The way they showed his inner brain workings visually is impressive and stunning. Kudos to the director, writer, and cinematographer 👏 Brady comes out of coma, thanks to the drug, and the drama shifts to courtroom. Interesting questions pop up in the courtroom arguments. Can we reverse a Frankenstein monster to a normal person? If that person goes for trial, can he be tried since the person who did the killing is gone from his system? Should he be hanged or studied for greater common good to humanity – saves people from diseases like Alzheimer’s, autism, Parkinson’s.

In third season I guess Stephen King being a writer himself asks and explores the existential question, can the writer and characters from the book live beyond the books!! What is the impact of the writer and characters from books on the readers? He links it back to survivors of Mr. Mercedes and to those whose lives crossed Brady. John Rothstein, Jimmy Gould, Susan, Brady, the Mercedes car, the paper weight – plays in people’s head in multiple ways – not everything has to make sense, right?

Stand out performances by most to all of the actors. I have to highlight the performances of Brendan Gleeson as Bill, Breeda Wool as Lou Linklatter, Justin Lupe as Holly Gibney, Harry Treadway as Brady, Holland Taylor as Ida Silver, Gaberiel Ebert as Morris Bellamy, they knock it out of the park 👏👌🏼 They make the show work!!