What’s it about?

The lives of an undercover federal agent, his best buddy and their tough-but-fair hard-to-please boss, an esteemed university professor and his best friend who is on the board of the university (he’d never betray his friend, right?), an architect who is a recovering oxycodone addict and her handsome sports-loving son who is perfect in every way and has never (and would never) do anything wrong, the original guy’s drug-addicted sister (heroin, not pain-killers – just to mix things up), Armenian drug lords (they mention their nationality a lot) (they’re Armenian), a Canadian drug lord named ‘Mother’ and his unflappably loyal sidekick, the city of Detroit, and some drug running teenagers all intertwine in tales of drug peddling, drug addiction, drug rehabilitation, corruption within the big-pharma industry and moral high grounding.

Yes. That is one sentence. It’s written in the style of the movie.

What did we think?

Stephen Scott says: Drugs are bad, mkay? 

South Park and Last Week Tonight with John Oliver know how to successfully tackle topics like this. In less than half an hour, they’ll explain: 

• the startling statistics (more Americans have died of painkiller overdoses than in the Vietnam war), 
• the horrific effects of addictive drugs like fentanyl, 
• the dangerous machinations behind smuggling operations that funnel drugs into the USA via Canada (maybe they should build a wall?), and
• the political, financial and moral corruption of the powerful pharmaceutical companies.

Not only that, but you’ll be entertained because they’ll tie it up with humour to make it a less bitter pill to swallow.

Instead, Crisis utilises the exceedingly dull public-service-announcement-disguised-as-a-gritty-drama template, utilising every cliche in the book to hammer home the moral high ground message: drugs are bad, mkay?

The acting is solid, and ¼ stars are awarded for the cast’s performances.

An extra ¼ star for Armie Hammer’s restraint at not nibbling on his castmates as they bleed in front of him.

Half a star. I’m being generous here. Don’t push me. ¼ out of 10