The six-part psychological thriller series ‘Dead Ringers’ started streaming on Amazon Prime Video a few days back. As most of you might already know, the show is based on David Cronenberg’s 1988 movie of the same name. Now, the question is: Is the ‘Dead Ringers’ series better than the original film and in case you have already seen the movie, then should you still watch the series on Prime Video?
The 1988 ‘Dead Ringers’ movie was a fictionalized version of the true story of identical twin gynaecologists Stewart and Cyril Marcus. The double role in the film was brilliantly essayed by Jeremy Irons. The movie’s underlying plot was about how the twins took advantage of their patients who were unable to know the difference between the two brothers. But an incident causes a rift in their relationship.
On the other hand, the Amazon Prime Video ‘Dead Ringers’ series does a gender swap as it features Rachel Weisz as the identical twins and obstetricians who want to revolutionize women’s health care system starting from New York.
Touching and rebooting an acclaimed film is mostly a double-edged sword. In this case, let’s analyse how the Rachel Weisz starrer ‘Dead Ringers’ series has fared in comparison to David Cronenberg’s classic flick.
As far as the critics’ reviews are concerned, just a few hours back, the Prime Video ‘Dead Ringers’ series even surpassed David Cronenberg’s original film on reviews aggregation portal Rotten Tomatoes. The movie held a critics’ score of 84% and the series was at 88%. But now, both the show and the film’s RT scores have levelled up and currently, they are both at 84% on Rotten Tomatoes.
On Metacritic, David Cronenberg’s movie has got a metascore of 86. On the other hand, the ‘Dead Ringers’ series is slightly behind the film with a still impressive metascore of 77. However, these critics’ ratings for Prime Video’s ‘Dead Ringers’ series might change in the future as the number of reviewers increase.
So, as of now, David Cronenberg’s ‘Dead Ringers’ movie has got a better critics’ score on both Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic. Does it mean you shouldn’t watch the Prime Video series starring Rachel Weisz, especially if you have seen the original film? That’s absolutely not the case here.
Prime Video’s ‘Dead Ringers’ series might have scored lower on these reviews aggregations portals, but the show is still binge-worthy even if you have seen the original film. Firstly because of a terrific performance from the ever-dependable Rachel Weisz’ which can be considered to be as first-rate as Jeremy Irons’ award-winning act. Moreover, plot-wise, the show takes a different route compared to the original film, so there is a lot of freshness in its execution.
Whether you’re a diehard fan of David Cronenberg’s ‘Dead Ringers’ movie or you still haven’t seen the 1988 film, Amazon Prime Video’s ‘Dead Ringers’ series starring Rachel Weisz is worth checking out. You can watch the show’s trailer first to get a better idea. Viewers’ discretion is advised though.
‘Dead Ringers’ Series Trailer –