Critical Condition: Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events

Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events

(Netflix, from Friday)

“What’s best of all about A Series of Unfortunate Events is how every element of it — from the performances and set pieces to the detailed production design and steady pacing — come together to form a complete, considered vision. As the show well knows, it’s a super weird vision — which is why it encourages you, with a nod and a wink, to look away at all costs. But if you can stand to watch, A Series of Unfortunate Events is a bewitching modern fairy tale, with all the hexes and perils that pretty genre implies.” — Variety.

“Netflix’s adaptation of the popular children’s book series is a horribly fun time … Each book takes up two episodes, so this inaugural season of eight installments covers the first four tales (The Bad Beginning, The Reptile Room, The Wide Window and The Miserable Mill). This better allows us to bask in the visually topsy-turvy and verbally dextrous world (where a running gag might revolve around elucidating the differences between ‘literally’ and ‘figuratively’) occupied by the tragedy-prone Baudelaire orphans.” — The Hollywood Reporter.

“Each generation apparently must have its own Lemony Snicket adaptation, and today’s 10-year-olds have been given a marvelously tangy one, courtesy of Netflix, that turns the franchise into an eight-episode series that becomes available on Friday. Parents: Brace yourselves for a dark turn in your children’s senses of humor and a marked improvement in their vocabularies.” — New York Times.

“After a disappointing Hollywood adaptation, the streaming giant takes on the curious world of Lemony Snicket – and the result is a daring, offbeat treat … Where 2004’s A Series of Unfortunate Events seemed hell-bent on boxing in the books’ wilder narrative instincts, Netflix’s adaptation expands out in all directions to let the saga’s freak flag fly. Written by [Daniel] Handler himself, the show gleefully exploits the tools of its new televisual trade to amplify the literary playfulness of its source material.” — The Guardian.

“What has always stood out about Handler’s books is that they approach children as if they are smart — and then help make them smarter. If it throws out a concept that they might not know, it explains it with humour. The books may have been aimed for reading pre-teens originally, but the series proves its worth for all ages.” — Los Angeles Daily News.