There needs to be more television like The Artful Dodger. While 2023 has been a great year for television, it's also been a heavy one with several incredibly dark endings. You would think that a sequel to Oliver Twist, one of the most well-known novels by one of the most famous authors, wouldn't really fit in with this catalogue of dramatic powerhouses. And you would be right! This show acts as a counterbalance to these miserable, complex stories of pain and vengeance, which is something I didn't know I wanted until now.
Jack Dawkins (Thomas Brodie-Sangster), otherwise known by his titular nickname, is a thief-turned-surgeon in the 1850s prison colony of Australia. After serving the prison sentence given to him in Oliver Twist, Dodger struggles to stay on the right side of the law and do his work; we see this in the opening scene of the series, where he hurries from gambling with criminals to amputating some poor guy's leg. The idea is clear—this is a push-and-pull series about whether Dodger can go straight, and there are forces pulling him towards both sides.
The best force by far is Norbert Fagin (David Thewlis), Dodger's former mentor who skulks around the alleyways of the colony looking for shiny stuff to steal. Thewlis is absolutely one of my favorite actors and I could watch him in anything, so him being a series regular was as fantastic a selling point as there could possibly be. (Damon Herriman, another favorite, plays one of the series' main villains.) Thewlis devours the role to no one's surprise, indulging in Fagin's grime and greed as though he owns it. His dynamic with his surrogate son is a delight to watch as he tries to find a way to connect with him while making as much money as possible.
It's a more exciting and believable and dynamic than Dodger's obligatory romance with Belle Fox (Maia Mitchell), a repressed upper-class woman and aspiring surgeon who worked wonderfully as a protege and friend, but not so much as an object of interest. It's a little odd that a character who is actively trying to avoid an arranged, generic romance is then put in another one, and therein lies the only large problem with The Artful Dodger—its predictability.
There's a good chance you can guess exactly where this show is going at any given point, and there's just as good a chance that you'll be right. That's not to say the story doesn't go in fun directions, but the show is much stronger when it's just messing around rather than trying to play on the audience's feelings. Not to say that it shouldn't have stakes, because there are very high stakes in the fun parts of the series. But the stakes and emotions in the serious parts just don't carry the same weight. There are only so many directions a show about a criminal trying to be legit can go, I suppose, but it would've been nice to have something to chew on with the more serious parts.
But man, when this series is fun, it's so fun. Brodie-Sangster injects tons of charisma into the lead and matches Thewlis's treachery, Mitchell's sarcasm, and Herriman's menace with ease, proving himself as a capable leading man. The production value is pretty good, the filmmaking is solid (although a decent portion of this show seems to be shot out of focus), and it's just a good time. In an era where so much TV focuses on misery, it's great to have fun little journeys like this one. Will there be a season two? Hope so! It's by no means perfect, but it's also a great way to spend eight hours, so I don't see why you wouldn't give the pilot a shot.
This season of The Artful Dodger is now available to stream on Disney+ and Hulu.
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