Anya Taylor-Joy made her name at a chessboard, as prodigy Beth Harmon in "The Queen's Gambit." Her return to television trades the quiet of the game for a getaway car. In "Lucky," which premieres Wednesday, July 15, on Apple TV, she plays a con artist whose life comes apart after a heist goes wrong.
The premise
The series follows Lucky, a grifter forced to run when a multimillion-dollar job collapses, pursued by both the FBI and a ruthless crime boss. It is a limited series created by Jonathan Tropper, who serves as co-showrunner with Cassie Pappas, and it draws on Marissa Stapley's bestselling novel. The cast around Taylor-Joy is deep, including Annette Bening, Timothy Olyphant, Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor and Drew Starkey. The first two episodes arrive Wednesday, with the rest rolling out weekly through August 19.
A new role behind the camera
"Lucky" is notable for Taylor-Joy off screen as well as on: it is her first credit as an executive producer, a step further into shaping the projects she stars in. It also continues a run of action-forward roles that has taken her from the art-house horror of "The Menu" to the blockbuster scale of "Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga," a marked turn from the period dramas that first defined her.
What critics say
Early notices are split. The Hollywood Reporter's Daniel Fienberg was unimpressed with the writing, calling the show "half frivolous lark, half self-important commentary, wholly nothing in particular" and arguing that seven episodes was the wrong length for the story. Even skeptical reviewers, though, tend to single out the cast, and Fienberg wrote that Taylor-Joy is "having a blast" slipping between the many personae her role demands. Other outlets have been warmer, describing the series as a propulsive crime thriller that leans on momentum and star power.
Worth a look?
For viewers, "Lucky" looks like the kind of star vehicle that lives or dies on its lead, and on that front the show has one of the more watchable performers working. Whether the writing matches her is the question the reviews leave open, one audiences can start answering when the series arrives on Wednesday.
