The Madness Review: Welcome To The Blandness

It’s hard to review something and be subjective at the same time. I’d like to think we as reviewers try and keep an open mind while also wanting to be critical of someone’s work. After all, nobody goes out of their way to make something bad.

The Madness has a good set up and idea. The opening couple of episodes aren’t perfect but do distil the idea of isolation and paranoia well. The idea of mystery. The problems came later, where the focus becomes less personal and more cliched with each episode. I also think the series is too long.

My other main problem is its focus on conversation. There is a lot of it to get through and I feel most of it drags it’s pacing as well as believability, regardless of how earnest it is at trying to portray important societal concerns. It ended up being a frustrating experience, knowing that written differently, this could have been good. In the end, it’s passable. Watchable. With the amount of content available to us to watch nowadays, is that good enough? I leave that up to you.

The Madness is a limited 8-episode series available to watch on Netflix. It was created by Stephen Belber.

Jessica Orr talks about more light hearted mystery dramas which have come out over the years. Give it a read. 

Story: Starts Well But Fades Over Time

The Madness stars Muncie Daniels as a known media pundit on CNN, struggling to make it as a big star. His latest interview doesn’t go down well. He’s been estranged from his wife; his kids aren’t on speaking terms with him. He decides to take time away from the city, go to the Poconos. Middle of nowhere.

Here he tries to de-stress. Meets the next-door neighbour. Soon, his generator has predictably broken down, the phone signal is non-existent. He looks to the next-door neighbour for help. He can’t. He’s dead. And Muncie is immediately running for his life from assailants. After a miraculous escape, he is soon framed for murder.

The story spirals from here. It could have been a tightly scripted affair, focusing on how Muncie would clear his name. The man killed also turns out to be a white supremist, which is an interesting development regarding race within the story. However, it fails to build on that tension. A lot of it feels surface level. There wasn’t enough character development between Muncie’s family to show why they’d grown apart or why they might get back together. There was the obvious mention of Muncie trying to go it alone, a tired male trope.

Muncie Daniels is having, what some might call, a “rough morning”

Society Ideology Angle

The white supremist angle, for me sits right on the fence. The Madness wants to use it without offending anyone. Nobody acts really evil or badly, until when it’s necessary for the show to have a focal point. The story also descends into having a “super baddie” who is a grand manipulator of people’s opinions. The longer the story went on, the more it fell away from what I think it was trying to say. And by the end, I don’t think it says much of anything.

There is a few scenes per episode exploring paranoia which again, look like it might explore the characters desperation and isolation, the need to be believed. I don’t think it does enough of that for it to be believable. 

I think its other problem was its use of action. There isn’t a lot of it, and what is there, is tension free. I’d also noticed that certain episodes felt like filler, they actively didn’t say much within them, but then had a big ending to justify its existence. Overall, it starts out well then goes for a big picture theme which i think is cliched and impersonal.

Muncie tracking down a lead in a “nice” neighbourhood

Characters & Performances: Family Are Decent & Everyone Else Does Fine

Colman Domingo stars as the main man, Muncie Daniels and I thought he was fine. His situation wasn’t always entirely believable, and I feel he was trying his best with the material he had to work with. His rapport with the family was good but most of the time it felt strained – but I felt that was due to the writing. One thing, and it’s a personal quirk, but he almost always had his mouth open. I found that odd i suppose.

Marsha Stephanie Blake as Munice’s wife Elena and Gabrielle Graham with Thaddeus J. Mixxum as his kids, Kallie and Demitrius were good. Gabrielle probably the best if I had to pick, but while all three of them are in a lot of scenes, I go back again to the writing where I just felt a lot of it was static. All three aren’t as close to Muncie as they used to be. Demitrius is starting to slide a little regarding school, being a teenager. He was probably a little annoying at time, couldn’t decide if he was going to be good or bad.

John Ortiz as FBI agent Franco Quinones is someone I’ve seen before and I like him as an actor. He’s solid here, does the job and has a warmth to him. Does what he can here. Tasmin Tapolski is Laura Jennings, the ex-wife of the man Muncie is accused of killing and I liked her. She does well trying to be herself, taking care of the kids, dealing with the white supremist stuff in her neighbourhood.

Of Muncie’s relationships, Gabrielle Graham as Kallie felt most realistic

Smaller Roles

The big one is Bradley Whitford as Stu Magnussen. He’s not in it for very long, I liked his scenes but overall, doesn’t impact the story in any meaningful way. However that’s the writing’s fault regarding how he’s presented and even how Muncie finds out about him. Bit of a waste.

Alison Wright as Julia Jayne is another one on Muncie’s radar. I didn’t like her. I thought she was rather boring. Didn’t have much of the presence required. And again, regarding the writing, found some of her decisions made her come across as frankly inept. Not the actor’s fault though.

Even smaller roles would be Deon Cole as Muncie’s lawyer Kwesi and old timer Stephen McKinley Henderson as his old friend Isiah. I liked them just fine.

Bradley Whitford has a cameo as Stu Magnussen, part of a cabal known as “Revitalise”

Cinematography & Sound: Nice All Round

The Madness does have some good points. And they are that it looks good and sound good. The show does go around a bunch of places. Most of the time to talk to people but it’s nice to see different locations. The forest and cabins at the beginning, to studios, theatres, lawyers buildings to diners. To see Kallie’s home in the neighbourhood to seeing Laura Jennings nice white picket fence neighbourhood.

The music by Phillip Klein was good. I enjoyed it. The opening credit song is catchy. The main theme tune is also catchy, done with a simple piano. Music fitted the mood, it was well done with the action set pieces. Very good all round.

Some of the cinemtography looked great

Editing & Pacing: Very Stop-Start

The Madness editing was fine. Most of the scenes weren’t long and got to the point. During the action scenes I did ask myself at times where people were, or how they could vanish or appear. It wasn’t a deal breaker but was noticeable.

The Madness pacing however, was similar in how I felt about the story. At the beginning, it’s not perfect but it’s getting the job done. Like how it was written however, the story seriously drags under the weight of it’s apparent need to be eight episodes. There is not eight episodes of a story here. A couple of episodes genuinely had them all talking to each other, before ending with some action or a twist.

There just wasn’t the momentum needed for this kind of show to maintain my interest. I wasn’t bored, but I was surprised at the series length for the story it was telling. It could have been told a lot quicker.