Colin Farrell’s private eye series Sugar returns with a more confident second season
Sugar had a bizarre twist that it worked too hard to conceal in the first season. Now with that out of the way, this second season is more sure-footed.
If you’re making a neo-noir with a private detective who is optimistic and believes in the best of humanity, is that still a neo-noir?
The trenchcoat-wearing investigators of film noir and their literary predecessors, created by the likes of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, had a world-weary edge to them.
They got to the bottom of their cases because they saw corruption and wrongdoing everywhere – even though Sam Spade was still vulnerable to some feminine wiles.
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By continuing you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy.So, how can you have a private eye lead whose nature mirrors that of the sunny Los Angeles skies above him? It’s not that he’s naïve, he’s just hopeful.
That’s what makes Sugar distinct, which returns for a more confident second season. The fact that it’s Colin Farrell playing the title character makes a difference, because Farrell is someone you want to see succeed.
He’s in the prime of a second chapter of his career, now choosing interesting projects, working with talented storytellers, and giving performances with layers. He’s well past those early years of dumb action thrillers that all bleed together.
That goodwill towards Farrell is something that’s transferred to John Sugar, a character who is easy to root for.
The general premise is that Sugar is a private investigator whose speciality is missing persons. In the first season, that was the granddaughter of a movie mogul.
But there was something that felt off for most of that first season, which turned out to be a big twist revealed at the end of its sixth episode, which is that Sugar is actually (spoiler alert!) an alien.
It was really weird and felt unnecessary, but it did explain why he could never get drunk despite his love of top-shelf whisky, and it gave context as to why he was so optimistic about humanity.
Private dicks are often outsiders who work around the periphery of the system, it gives them a clear-eyed view of things, but in the case of Sugar, he was literally not of this world.
That reveal came too late in season one but with that now out of the way, at least it gives a grounding to this more sure-footed second chapter.
The series, created by Mark Protosevich (screenwriter of I Am Legend), makes little hay about Sugar’s alienness (we don’t see Farrell in the prosthetics again), and there is a sub-plot thrumming about his missing sister, but it now mostly functions as a character point.
It’s something you keep in the back of your mind as an aspect which drives how he approaches his investigation, and why he loves old Hollywood movies. It’s as if Sugar is constantly hoping to shape the real world after the ones on screen, where happy endings are possible.
This season, the overarching story involves an up-and-coming wrestler, Danny Moon (Jin Ha), whose brother Ji-seok (Raymond Lee) has disappeared. It has the classic noir hallmarks of corrupt authorities and a drug conspiracy with far-reaching control and consequences.
Other newcomers to the cast includes Sasha Calle and Shea Whigham as a couple of associates who end up helping Sugar in his quest, and Laura Donnelly as a femme fatale figure.
Sugar is not groundbreaking TV, and certainly we are seeing a resurgence of private eyes on screen, but this more cohesive second season, gives you genre fans plenty to like.
Sugar is streaming on Apple TV
