This Disney+ miniseries does something that feels positively radical these days, said Anita Singh in The Daily Telegraph: “It tells a story straightforwardly and in chronological order.” The subject is Elizabeth Holmes – once the US’s youngest self-made female billionaire, owing to the hype around her company’s blood-testing technology, now a convicted fraudster. The drama is slow to get going, but it becomes irresistible.
Amanda Seyfried plays Holmes, the college dropout turned Silicon Valley pin-up, with “saucer-eyed oddness”, while the excellent supporting cast includes Stephen Fry and William H. Macy. Seyfried somehow manages to keep our sympathy as this complex woman – “blunt but charming, hyper-focused but chaotic” – slips ever further into corruption and lies, said Lucy Mangan in The Guardian. It’s a “hugely skilful” performance in a show that is clunky at times, but compelling all the same.
Seyfried is brilliant, said Emily Baker in The i Paper, which is just as well, because the series is not. It’s interesting enough, but it is not nearly as fun as Netflix’s soapy drama Inventing Anna – about another real-life female fraudster – while suffering from the same kinds of flaws: The Dropout is far too admiring of its subject (portraying her as a lone female “business warrior”, battling against boardrooms full of grey men), and it fails sufficiently to interrogate the actions and motives of a woman who not only swindled investors, but duped doctors and endangered patients’ lives.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
September 28 editorial cartoonsCartoons Sunday's political cartoons include the Jim Comey indictment and Pam Bondi as a the Wicked Witch of the West
-
The Liberal Democrats: on the march?Talking Point After winning their highest number of seats in 2024, can the Lib Dems marry ‘stunts’ with a ‘more focused electoral strategy’?
-
Your Party: a Pythonesque shamblesTalking Point Comical disagreements within Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana's group highlight their precarious position
-
6 rustic homes on ranchesFeature Featuring copper kitchen counters in Colorado and a 380-acre property in California
-
Steve: a ‘gripping’ drama starring Cillian MurphyThe Week Recommends Murphy plays the frazzled headmaster of a boarding school for ‘delinquent’ boys in this bold Indie film
-
The Lady from the Sea: a ‘thrillingly contemporary’ Ibsen adaptationThe Week Recommends ‘Luminous’ cast dazzle in Simon Stone’s ‘hugely enjoyable’ production
-
Black Rabbit: slick crime thriller set in a high-end New York restaurantThe Week Recommends Two Manhattan brothers resort to ‘ever-more high-stakes’ schemes to tackle ‘huge’ gambling debts in the ‘glossy’ series
-
One Battle After Another: a ‘terrifically entertaining’ watchThe Week Recommends Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest release is a ‘high-octane action thriller’ and a ‘surefire Oscar frontrunner’
-
The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny: a novel of ‘undeniable power’The Week Recommends Kiran Desai’s first novel in nearly 20 years is an ‘enthralling love story’ set across India and the US
-
Color Theories: Julio Torres’ one-man showPerformance Space New York Performance Space New York
-
The 2025 Emmys: A big night for newcomersFeature The 77th Emmys were full of surprises, from shocking wins and moving speeches to a host’s charity stunt that backfired
