'Dope Thief' series review: Brian Tyree Henry & Wagner Moura make a huge mess in Apple TV+ crime drama

Apple TV+

Finding new ways to fight in the war on drugs? Hell yeah, that's dope, man! You can find out more when you check out Dope Thief, a new miniseries that stars Brian Tyree Henry and Wagner Moura as Ray Driscoll and Manny Carvalho respectively, two Philadelphian best friends, who have found a questionable yet seemingly successful business model: posing as DEA agents, stealing the drug money and giving away the product to their "handler" and drug trafficker Son Pham (Dustin Nguyen).

Everything is going swimmingly until one particular raid at a farm on the outskirts of town, for which they've hired an accomplice named Rick (Spenser Granese). The confrontation escalates into a shootout, which results in the deaths of Rick, undercover DEA agent Jack (Gabriel Ebert) and a serious injury of his fellow agent Mina (Marin Ireland). This sets off a manhunt for Ray and Manny, and an investigation into their and their associates' swindle, as they're chased by both the DEA and a mysterious drug overlord who witnessed their botched raid. The show also features Kate Mulgrew as Ray's adoptive mom Theresa, Ving Rhames as his incarcerated dad Bart, Amir Arison as Mina's boss Mark Nader, Nesta Cooper as the Driscolls' lawyer Michelle Taylor and Liz Caribel Sierra as Manny's girlfriend Sherry.

Adapted from Dennis Tafoya's book of the same name, and written and created by Peter Craig, the series gets off to a great start with its first two episodes in particular. The premise alone is rather fantastic and the way that we, the audience, learn about Ray and Manny's personalities, lives and motivations is straightforward and precise. There's real propulsion in those first two episodes when it comes to this situation that the two guys find themselves in and you really get a sense that both of them have pasts that led them here. A major part to this success is great casting (by casting director Avy Kaufman), which builds a community that feels real and true, starting with actors portraying the entire Driscoll family and extending to all the supporting players. Henry gets most of the meaty material and he is a more than decent lead for the show, but it is when he's sparring with Rhames, Ireland or Mulgrew that the drama is at its most appealing.

What's unfortunate is that the show is often a two-hander and Moura is mostly giving a really vague, uneven performance opposite Henry. As a result, Manny begins to feel terribly out of place in the story as we move along, and Moura's annoyingly shouty performance is a real burden whenever Manny shows up. Eventually, this performance becomes a mirror for the series' overall lack of cohesion and purpose, which stems from poor direction (including by Ridley Scott and Craig who directs the finale) and the repetitive nature of Craig's writing. Nauseating camera work (cinematographers include Erik Messerschmidt and Yaron Orbach), awkwardly devised romances between Ray and Michelle as well as Manny and Sherry, tonal whiplash and endless, dull shootouts are just some of the ingredients that make for a meal which tends to taste cheap and unnourishing.

When (or if) you get to this gritty crime drama's second half, the ugliness of the directors' images and Craig's character work is very frustrating, making the trek towards the finale a real slog to get through, and it doesn't help that the final few scenes in the finale don't flow together at all. Dope Thief's story merely touches on loyalty, consequences of one's actions and sacrifice without ever truly digging deep into any of those thematic threads. This grift is fun for a short while, but the return isn't quite worth the trouble—the excellent introduction soon becomes a distant memory as the series loses its tenacity, coherence, as well as its grasp on reality.

Smileys: Premise, casting

Frowneys: Directing, Wagner Moura, writing

Brian Tyree Henry and Wagner Moura star in 'The 2 Dopes'.

2.0/5

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