Surface premiered on Apple TV+ on July 29 with three episodes that quickly grabbed our attention and sparked questions that demanded answers. Unfortunately, those three episodes set up a suspense-filled adventure that was never fully realized. As the series progressed, the pace suffered, dragging out a story that was not complex enough to withstand the eight-episode run. Not only that, the characters devolved right before our eyes into overused clichés that became very difficult to care about.
This is not to say that the acting is terrible. On the contrary, Gugu Mbatha-Raw carries the series as Sophie, successfully translating her character’s emotional journey toward finding the truth. Her confusion and frustration with everything around her are easily understood. Alas, this outstanding performance is dulled by the lack of depth in the overall story. This is most evident in the roles of the supporting characters. Like Mbatha-Raw, the actors gave good performances, but most, like Marianne Jean-Baptiste, were underutilized.
François Arnaud’s Harrison definitely deserved more to do. We get hints of Harrison’s mistrust of Sophie early on, but we never see it played out. Even after discovering his connection to Baden (Stephen James), we’re not privy to how they met or their initial agreement; we’re only told about it. For someone who claims to be motivated by the idea of protecting his friend, an opportunity was missed to showcase the many facets of an individual who would descend into villainy for the sake of someone else.
In contrast, much time was given to understanding James (Oliver Jackson-Cohen), maybe too much time. Episode six gives us a backstory to our main couple, told from James’ perspective. This allows us to see who he is and, more importantly, who he isn’t. In fact, we learn more about him than anyone else in the series. Somewhat naive, we finally understand the dynamic between him and Sophie. She showed him how to play the game, and he loved her for it. He also resented her natural ability to command attention. She wasn’t just who he wanted; she was who he wanted to be.
Even though Sophie is the focus, the dealings of those around her in the events leading up to her incident are just as important to the story. With almost every episode having a different writer and director, the continuity in the telling of the story was hard to maintain. Instead of spending an entire episode on a drug trip that could have been a montage, more could have been done to give weight to the relationships between the characters. Allowing the audience to see these characters without Sophie would have helped garner some type of affection for them. Instead, we’re left not really caring about anyone because we don’t know them well enough to do so, or what we do know about them is not generating any empathy.
By the end, you’re just left with what you probably already surmised from the beginning — everyone is terrible. But hey, at least all my questions were answered.
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
All episodes of ‘Surface’ season 1 are now streaming on Apple TV+.
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