City Of Shadows, a new Spanish thriller on Netflix, involves a troubled police detective and his reluctant partner investigating ritual killings in Barcelona. There are a lot of interesting shot of the city’s most historic locations, and the troubled cop has a bit of a mental health history, but will that be enough to make the show distinctive?
Opening Shot: A man in a suit lies on the floor of a locked cell, moaning for water.
The Gist: Soon that man is hooded by his captors and taken in a van to La Pedrera – Casa Milà, a landmark building in Barcelona. He’s hung off a balcony, doused in a flammable liquid and set ablaze as the entire gruesome killing is recorded.
It’s October, 2010. Milo Malart (Isak Férriz), a detective for Mossos d’Esquadra, the police force of Catalonia, is called by Susana Cabrera (Ana Wagener), a judge in charge of investigations. He’s on suspension after assaulting a colleague, but Susana needs him back on active duty after the CEO of a construction company was found burned to death, hanging off a balcony at La Pedera.
When he returns, he’s greeted with hostility by the other detectives, and is paired up with Rebeca Garrido (Verónica Echegui), who works for the National Police and was brought over from Madrid. As they look into the killing, it seems that the historic building and its architect, Antoni Gaudí, are factors into why the murder was so gruesome and public.
In the meantime, as a condition of his return, Milo speaks to a therapist, who tries to see where his mind is at since the untimely suicide of his nephew, to whom he was close. Milo still has dreams where the nephew asks him for help, and it seemed that his death might have contributed to the incident of insubordination that got him suspended. It also led to tension in his marriage, and he’s on his way to a divorce.
Milo is called on the carpet by his boss for suggesting that the case was a ritualized murder by a possible serial killer. Milo knows that Rebeca was the one who said those things to the boss, but is pleasantly surprised to know that she agrees with his assessment of the case.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Written by Jorge Torregrossa and based on a novel by Aro Sáinz de la Maza, City Of Shadows has a similar story to the series The Valhalla Murders. There are aspects of the show, though, that feel more like an episodic thriller like The Blacklist.
Our Take: Other than the fact that the first murder we see in City Of Shadows takes place at a landmark building in Barcelona, there’s nothing about the show that really stands out to us. You have the detective on the edge, using his copious investigative skills to try to solve the case and keep more people from dying, but he’s hampered at almost every turn by the colleagues that distrust him. There’s the outsider cop who’s brought in to keep him in line. And while the killings themselves are distinctive, the show feels like something we’ve seen many times before.
Yes, there’s room for some twists and turns, and more of an examination of Milo’s state of mind, especially given the shock of his nephew’s suicide, and the history of mental illness in his family. But as the case goes along and more bodies pile up, it feels like the show is going to be more of a grim march to finding the killer before he or she kidnaps their next victim than being an examination of the reasons for the murders or the backstories of the people trying to find the killer.
Performance Worth Watching: Verónica Echegui, who passed away in August, has a calming presence as Rebeca, who trusts Milo’s instincts more than the judgement of her colleagues and superiors, who don’t seem to be Milo’s biggest fans.
Sex And Skin: None.
Parting Shot: Milo gets a call from Susana telling him that another executive has been kidnapped.
Sleeper Star: We’ll give this to the shots of the various landmark buildings and other areas in Barcelona, starting with Casa Milà.
Most Pilot-y Line: There is a definite CGI feel to the scene where the construction CEO is set on fire.
Our Call: STREAM IT. City Of Shadows goes into that large middle category of shows, ones that are decent enough but don’t distinguish themselves by offering viewers much that they haven’t seen a number of times before.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.