Smoke (2025) Series Review: Burn the Pages

Smoke is a sprawling investigative thriller about a couple of serial arsonists, with an overabundance of plot threads that go nowhere.

Furthermore, the mystery of who the criminals are is not what the show is about at all; that much is revealed to us right away. Smoke is a mystery thriller that’s much more about the why than the who or what. It’s a sprawling ensemble piece with dual protagonists in which the fates of different characters intertwine and slowly pull back the layers to reveal how they ended up here. And in doing so, it becomes a complete mess that only gets worse with every new episode, as it needlessly overcomplicates a very simple plot.

Dave Gudsen (Taron Egerton, of Tetris) is the leading arson investigator in charge of both cases. He’s a good American family man with a stepson who hates him and a wife he loves almost as much as he loves himself. In the book he’s started writing, he depicts himself as some sort of alpha male action hero who’s impossibly handsome and overqualified. As his wife remarks, the book could need some female characters too to combat the “dudeness”. Dave’s ego is all-encompassing, and most people around him would agree that he’s an a*hole who’s a pain to deal with, but he’s also very good at his job and well respected there. What they don’t know is that on top of being the leading arson investigator, he’s also one of the serial arsonists they’re trying to catch.

Michelle Calderone (Jurnee Smollett, of The Order) is a detective who’s assigned to join the investigation, to Dave’s dismay. He’s right to be upset about it, as Michelle pretty quickly becomes suspicious of Dave’s role in all of this. The only problem is she doesn’t know how to prove it. Michelle doesn’t know about arson; that’s Dave’s field of expertise. Meanwhile, she’s also dealing with her own personal demons: the boss she used to have an affair with still has an eye on her, and the mother she despises after an incident in her childhood is about to be freed from prison against her wishes.

Freddy Fasano (Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine, of Farewell Amor) has nothing to do with the police or any detective work. He’s a down-on-his-luck guy working at a fast food place with no perspective. He doesn’t talk much and prefers to be left alone. For the most part nobody even really notices him in his day-to-day life, and he likes it that way. Still, he’s a man filled with deep sadness and nothing to pull him out of it. The only happiness he gets out of life is when he puts the houses of more fortunate people on fire, and with it their joyous lives.

There are a couple more characters who are heavily featured in the show and whose backstories we explore, but frankly few of these people really matter, and even fewer of their backstories are interesting. Smoke is the prime example of a narrative that’s dragged out endlessly because it needs to fit into the format of a TV show. There are so many side characters, all of them with their own subplots for the sake of having another subplot, none of which matter even in the slightest. The twisty main story completely loses its focus the moment it moves past the basic setup of cops vs arsonists; with so many left turns, it ends up in a place unrecognizable to where it started.

For as flawed as the story by Dennis Lehane is, the actors give it their absolute all. Taron Egerton lends Dave a casual swagger and confident charm that makes it hard to hate him even if he’s a complete a*hole, while Jurnee Smollett brings an intensity to her role that clashes beautifully with Egerton’s nonchalance. But Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine is the real star. He’s unrecognizable and completely disappears into his role in a way that is utterly astonishing. The rest of the ensemble is great too; it’s just too bad they didn’t get a better story to work with.

The one aspect of Smoke that’s fantastic, though, is its use of fire. It’s what makes the show unique from other crime stories, and the directors make good use of it. Sometimes fire is depicted as a beautiful, almost mystical force that puts you in a trance with its swirling flames. Other times it’s the stuff of nightmares with endless smoke that makes any escape attempt futile, as the skin literally burns off your bones. Whenever the show uses fire, it is an incredible display of filmmaking that captures this unpredictable element; unfortunately, they don’t make nearly enough use of it. Like everything else in the plot, it gets lost in the shuffle of meaningless interpersonal drama.

A serial killer show about arsonists is an interesting proposition, and the primary theme it wants to explore – fragile masculinity and the lengths men will go to to feel superior – is  relevant for the current moment. But it’s unfortunately a complete mess that changes directions so many times with nothing to hold your attention. Smoke somehow manages to feel both endlessly dragged out and way overstuffed. There are so many plot threads, with many of them adding nothing, and not even in a way where they simply don’t connect to the main story; in multiple cases they’re literally just abandoned eventually. It embodies the worst impulses of the television medium, with so much happening that it’s hard to care about anything.

The season premiere of Smoke will be available to stream globally on Apple TV+ on June 27, 2025, followed by a weekly rollout with the finale on August 15.

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