Benedict Cumberbatch in a hallucinatory thriller: what is Eric worth? (critical)

A devilishly original and confusing crime series, but not as crazy as it would like to be.

Benedict Cumberbatch reconnect with his side Sherlock. In Ericthe new crime series which comes out this Friday on Netflix, the old Doctor Strange desperately searches for his missing son in the twists and turns of a filthy New York, with the help of a giant stuffed animal straight out of his imagination. A multi-faceted thriller, sometimes exciting, but very uneven.

In Ericthe English actor plays Vincent, a TV star totally out of step with the children's puppet show that he created (a sort of variation of the show Sesame Street). While he preaches kindness and compassion in his program, Vincent hides a dark and tortured personality. A misanthropic alcoholic, full of himself and not really happy in his marriage, Vincent is turned upside down when his 9-year-old little boy mysteriously disappears on the way to school. When the police have no leads, Vincent decides to go looking for his kid, with the help… of a big, 2 meter blue stuffed animal named Eric. Obviously, Eric doesn't really exist, except in Vincent's head. A sort of outlet in the shape of a giant teddy bear, it allows him to support his daily suffering and his hatred of others.

The pair thus surveys New York in the 1980s from top to bottom. From the beautiful neighborhoods from which Vincent comes, to the filthy subway tunnels where the most deprived live, rejected by a capitalist system that takes no prisoners. The British screenwriter Abi Morgan (who signed the nice biopic Iron Woman and the very sulfurous Shame) has a lot to say. It describes a sordid city dominated by rotten cops and careerist politicians. Relying on this sticky atmosphere, we feel thatEric wants to explore these societal themes in depth, to denounce the systemic racism or the scathing homophobia of the time. The actor McKinley Belcher III thus stands out as a gay African-American inspector, tired of having to put on a show in front of his fellow police officers. His stoic incarnation is overwhelming. And that's whereEric is undeniably the most exciting.

In doing so, she also loses the thread of her hallucinated strangeness. The investigations of Vincent and his stuffed animal become indispensable. The imagined teddy bear doesn't add much to the story, apart from throwing a few scathing jokes here and there. The artifice becomes more and more useless, even cumbersome for a Benedict Cumberbatch stunning melancholy. By oscillating between the Zodiac of Fincher and the Birdman of Iñárritu, Eric struggling to find its reason for being.

Eric, in 6 episodes, mini-series to watch on Netflix on May 31, 2024.