Reel Review Mom

This doesn’t make things cool with us Netflix….. far from it, but it’s a start perhaps!

New to Netflix as of August 28th is the Thursday Night Murder Club starring Helen Miren, Pierce Brosnan and that dude from Star Trek. It seems like it’s like the show is in direct competition with Hulu’s Only Murderers in the Building with Selena Gomez and Chevy Chase and that other dude & I kind of love Helen Miren more, so, as much as it pains me to admit, the Netflix version rules.

I kind of feel like I might be able to relate to old people being stuffed in assisted living homes with time on their hands AND they want to be armchair sleuths…  I want to be armchair sleuth now, but I’m lazy and can’t commit. I’m also only 47 years old & I still live at home paying a mortgage with my 10 yr old daughter, so I don’t think I meet the minimum requirements for assisted living armchair sleuthing.

Anyway, back to the actual review…. Netflix’s The Thursday Murder Club is what happens when Agatha Christie meets The Golden Girls (I’m Dorothy, FYI), but with more body bags and less cheesecake. Set in the genteel Coopers Chase retirement village, the story introduces four pensioners who treat solving murders like others treat knitting circles. Only instead of cozy scarves, they’re unraveling alibis.

Helen Mirren’s Elizabeth is so effortlessly sharp you half expect her to kill someone herself just to spice things up. Celia Imrie’s Joyce is all sugar on the outside but clearly has a streak of steel underneath (the kind of woman who’d lend you sugar for cookies and cyanide in equal measure). Pierce Brosnan huffs and puffs his way through as Ron, still fighting battles decades after the unions ended, while Ben Kingsley’s (oooh, that’s  his name!) Ibrahim quietly dissects psyches like they’re Sudoku puzzles.

The film isn’t edge-of-your-seat suspense—it’s more like a leisurely stroll with a dead body propped up in the garden. The murder mystery itself is fine, if not groundbreaking, but honestly, the fun is watching these retirees gleefully outsmart police, crooks, and sometimes themselves.

Dark comedy laces the coziness, reminding us that old age isn’t about bingo nights—it’s about being underestimated long enough to get away with murder (or at least solving one). Yes, the pacing meanders and the visuals sometimes feel like a BBC Sunday drama left in the sun too long, but the wit, chemistry, and cheeky morbidity make it deliciously entertaining.

Think tea with arsenic: comforting, funny, and just dangerous enough to keep you hooked.

I’m down and I still have all my teeth!