Sex, music and cringe – HBO's The Idol
HBO’s newest Sunday night series is buzzy, features an all-star cast, and was co-created by musician the Weeknd. So why are the reviews so dismal? We unpack The Idol.
There's been a lot of buzz about the latest show to fill HBO's prestigious Sunday night slot, The Idol.
Co-created by a team including Euphoria's Sam Levinson and Canadian pop-icon the Weeknd, the series follows a pop star played by Lily Rose Depp who's working on her comeback after a mental health crisis.
But what was initially sold as a sexy satire of the music industry's dark underbelly has been panned by critics and mocked on the internet.
Today, Vox senior correspondent Alex Abad-Santos and Lucy Ford, a culture writer with British GQ, take us through the series so far and why it's garnering attention for all the wrong reasons.