The Assassin: action-packed caper is 'terrific fun'

"The Assassin" is an "absolute cracker", said Tom Peck in The Times. Comedy thrillers are hard to "pull off" but Amazon's new six-part show is an "education in how it should be done".

Keeley Hawes stars as Julie, a former hitwoman who is living a quiet life on a Greek island when she's "drawn out of retirement for one last job". To make things even more stressful, her son Edward (Freddie Highmore) has just come to visit her for the first time in four years.

Weaving together "thrills and laughs" in "very quick succession", episode one sees the pair take a break from a "full-on massacre", during which Edward asks his "blood-spattered, gun-toting mother: 'Are you really not going to tell me why you're some kind of perimenopausal James Bond?'"

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Show creators Harry and Jack Williams ("The Tourist") have successfully breathed new life into a "familiar formula", said Pat Stacey in The Irish Independent. Packed with "corkscrew twists" and "enough shady characters to block out the Greek sun", it's "terrific fun".

"Stylish, witty" and "tightly written", the show is "perfectly crafted preposterousness", said Lucy Mangan in The Guardian. Hawes becomes even more "impressive" with every role she takes on, this time trading "barbed exchanges" with Highmore, her "nimble and perfectly pitched" son.

The pair's "spiky chemistry is off the charts", said Emily Baker in The i Paper. But the plot moves along at such a "zippy pace" that I found it difficult to keep up with the "tangled mess of storylines".

The set-up is a little "stilted", ticking off "every cliché in the book" in the first episode, said Rebecca Nicholson in the Financial Times. By the second instalment, though, the show "settles into solidly entertaining potboiler territory".

There's usually a lull in the summer television schedule, so this "tongue-in-cheek action caper" is a very "welcome" addition, said Anita Singh in The Telegraph. Yes, there are some "logical inconsistencies" and the pace "slackens" after the first two episodes. "Don't think too hard about it. Just enjoy the ride."