Do critics like the new horror comedy show ‘The Bondsman’?
Do critics like the new horror comedy show ‘The Bondsman’?
Kevin Bacon headlines this new Prime Video series, and reviews are showing it might well be worth your effort to stream.
Prime Video has an eclectic mix of original shows and movies in its library. The streamer isn’t afraid to try new things, even if they don’t always work out; it sprinkles a little bit of everything into its catalog, from sweeping fantasy epics like “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” and “The Wheel of Time” to action-packed titles like “Citadel” and much more.
The service tries to appeal to a multitude of audience groups, and its next attempt at crowd-pleasing content comes in the form of a new series called “The Bondsman.” The show makes its premiere on Thursday, April 3, but its concept leaves room for doubt as to whether or not critics will go wild for the series.
“The Bondsman” stars Kevin Bacon as a bounty hunter named Hub Halloran, who is forced to work for the Devil himself after being murdered and sent to Hell. Hub is ordered to track down demons who have escaped and sending them back where they belong. The horror comedy series also stars Jennifer Nettles, Damon Herriman, Beth Grant, Maxwell Jenkins, and Jolene Purdy.
Reviews for “The Bondsman” so far indicate the show is at least worth your time, even if it won’t sweep the Emmy Awards. It sports an 85% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, but it has achieved only a 55 on MetaCritic, indicating “Mixed or Average” reviews. We’ve assembled reviews from some of Hollywood’s most respected critics so you can see whether “The Bondsman” is worth your time or not.
Watch the trailer for ‘The Bondsman’
Angie Han | The Hollywood Reporter
Outside of Bacon’s performance, the horror dramedy is more of a mixed bag — fitfully amusing but rarely as funny or heartfelt or surprising as it wants to be, and never as memorable as its attention-grabbing premise might lead you to hope.
Clint Worthington | RogerEbert.com
Granted, “The Bondsman”‘s eight thirty-minute episodes go down easy, and it’s a breeze to blow through it in an afternoon. But by the time you’re done, and the cheap-as-nails climax in the suburban Atlanta woods leads to the uninteresting cliffhanger for a second season, you’ll be left wondering whether you’d sell your soul to get that time back.
Alex Maidy | JoBlo
The Bondsman is escapist entertainment in the best ways possible. Kevin Bacon looks to be having more fun in this role than he has in years, with the balance of genres and tones working throughout the series. Compared to other genre offerings I mentioned at the start of this review, The Bondsman never gets too focused on taking itself seriously, which allows the audience to have fun watching Kevin Bacon dispatch monsters in creative ways.
Brian Tallerico | AV Club
Maybe a quarter-century from now, someone will resurrect this idea and try the Brimstone and Bondsman template again—and do it right for once. As someone once said, the greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist. It would be best to treat The Bondsman the same way.
Felipe Rangel | Screen Rant
The supernatural backdrop serves to put in motion an interesting mystery with plenty of action set pieces along the way. The Bondsman very much plays like a B-movie but in the format of a TV series. There is a charm to how that is pulled off, and while I struggled to get into it at the start, the show and its characters grew on me throughout the season.
Lucy Mangan | The Guardian
There is nothing very new to see in The Bondsman. How much you enjoy it will depend on how much you enjoy Kevin Bacon (laconic, hard-bitten Kevin Bacon, not Tremors Kevin Bacon and not Footloose Kevin Bacon), how much you enjoy tales of demonic possession in a small town in southern America and how much you enjoy the sound of partly severed heads, blown-out tracheas and bloodied fingers. I am seven degrees of separation from liking this last aspect.
Meagan Navarro | Bloody Disgusting
Outside of a few of its central characters, “The Bondsman” lacks a distinguishing personality. The rough visual effects and predictable drama only highlight the lack of worldbuilding and tonal whiplash. It’s a series that tries to be a horror-comedy, family drama, and violent crime thriller all at once but without the time or finesse to make any of it coherent or engaging. The concept behind the series is a strong one and it still has potential; the season ends with an intriguing hook.
Cheryl Eddy | Gizmodo
The demon-slaying scenes are extremely fun (the CG is definitely lower-budget, but it fits the grungy vibes of the show), and The Bondsman also incorporates a larger cosmic mystery for Hub to puzzle through. But the show is really about a man sorely in need of redemption who gets an unexpected shot at it. Hub regrets messing up with Maryanne, and he’s starting to lose touch with their teen son Cade (Lost in Space‘s Maxwell Jenkins), especially since Maryanne has moved on with new guy in town Lucky (Justified‘s Damon Herriman), whose sketchy past sets Hub’s teeth on edge.
Aidan Kelley | Collider
Overall, The Bondsman relies far too much on familiar tropes from similar stories. That said, the series does gain much more momentum in its finale by introducing a genuinely creepy villain with an intriguing backstory and a terrifying method of slaying her victims; it also ends in a way that definitely steers the plot in an intriguing direction. When the show finally starts to stretch out of its comfort zone and begins setting up a horror comedy, it finds its own distinct identity. It’s just unfortunate The Bondsman doesn’t get to that point sooner.
Prime Video
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