Critic Reviews

At its core, though, Expats is a meditation on womanhood and the ancillary pressures placed on them by society, parents, children, partners, and even themselves. a deeply heart-wrenching drama, Expats is not always an easy watch. But Wang has gifted us with a truly formidable show, the kind that sticks with you long after the credits roll.

Wang makes it easy to see how individuals connect to a family, how families connect to a community, and how communities connect to society at large. Sometimes, it can be difficult to recognize how our personal motivations affect other people, especially when catastrophes feel big enough to overwhelm everything else, but “Expats” expertly breaks life down into parts, before bringing it all together again in a moving, unshakable portrait.

What elevates the series beyond a potentially maudlin plot is the nuanced sense of connectedness Wang conjures, not just among central characters plucked from their home countries, but also between the expats and the diverse, teeming, politically precarious urban island they’ve chosen to inhabit.

“Expats” is a deeply nuanced and dark narrative about the things women sweep under the rug, and what happens when they become too weary to cover them up.

Although slow at certain points, Expats is otherwise exactly what we’ve come to expect from a Kidman-led drama: It’s full of twists, complex female characters, and an engrossing enigma of a plot.

“Expats” is a richly layered, beautifully photographed and profoundly affecting work.

The series, adapted and directed by Lulu Wang, plays out like the novel on which it is based: there are no neat conclusions, just overlapping stories and messy relationships, and a sense of melancholy. At its heart is Hong Kong itself, captured by cinematographer Anna Franquesa-Solano.

Expats is patient in its storytelling, which is not to suggest it’s boring — rather, it trusts in the compassion of its writing and the rawness of its performances to hold our attention as its three leads circle around their unwieldy feelings or flail in their ugly fallout.

Wang’s storytelling abilities and talent for showing the nuances of everyday life ground this tale of wealth and trauma while taking it in a fresh direction. A bold new step for a consistently exciting director. Just so you know, whilst we may receive a commission or other compensation from the l

Expats is an unusual beast. Its deliberately piecemeal approach makes it seems unlikely that Wang will offer us a neat and tidy ending, preferring instead to present a tale that is frequently hard to pin down. Which, for a story about people far from home, might be precisely the point.