I reviewed the US version of Mad Dogs after seeing the first, pilot episode, and what I wrote then still more or less stands and this is it. But I have added a few more comments at the end after watching another six to qualify that.
I'm rather baffled why the U.S. has a compulsion to remake films and, as here, series and doesn't just present its audiences with the original. The remakes are often quite good, but why remake them? But anyhow...
I've seen all three seasons of the original Brit version of Mad Dogs and I can't recommend it highly enough for often very funny sly humour, suspense, intrigue and sheer entertainment. And I'm happy to report that this remake is almost as good - at least in the first few episodes - most probably because the Brit creator, Cris Cole, is again at the helm. That is a relief after seeing so many films (from all around the world) which eventually let you down. As I say the humour, very British humour I have to say, does travel well, and might have you laughing out loud on occasion, but it is far more than just a black comedy. The first episode starts off slowly and quietly, then 42 minutes in . . . I can recommend this. The casting is excellent, the dialogue natural and the story quite bizarre. Don't hesitate, please, treat yourselves.
POSTSCRIPT: For the US market, the producers have tinkered a little - well, tinkered quite a lot - syncopating the original plots and expanding the story, introducing new characters and, it has to be said, in the process they created something of a different animal. Whereas in the original British version the humour - very black and often unobtrusive - was a continual thread throughout (until the two- episode finale which was something of a letdown) and formed the series backbone, for the US the humour is more or less abandoned as a central trope and the series becomes more of an action piece. There's nothing wrong with that, but it does lose a little of its edge as a result. But then it is intended for a different market and culture.
Another difference is that despite the utterly bizarre plot twists and very silly situations the four characters find themselves in, in the original version it all somehow holds together well - it's as though they are caught in a one-way system and there's no turning back. Conversely the new version increasingly doesn't quite hold together: there are several points where the four could all have disentangled themselves quite well by a word here and there, and that they didn't has more to do with making a TV series than anything else.
The twists don't grow out of the situations the four find themselves in - and their very stupid decisions - but from the necessity to keep the story going and interesting. That's rather a shame, as it loses something rather neat. It also becomes as it goes on, plotwise, something of a mess - folk get around Belize with an ease and at a speed which is only possible on TV. But such quibbles won't, I'm sure, disturb your average US viewer. The Brit version, though didn't take the easy way out and just kept it all going, following its own logic, which was some achievement. The final episodes here see everything tied up a little too neatly which is a shame and out of keeping with the original wackiness. Sad to say the US version doesn't quite convince
However, despite those drawbacks your average viewer should enjoy this, but I must stress that for a real treat and a rather tighter piece of work you should seek out the British version which doesn't quite cut corners so easily.
