Ares
Dutch with English Subtitles
Season 1 (2020) – 8 Episodes approx. 30 minutes each
2 out of 5 paws
Ares is the first Dutch series to be created as a Netflix Original which is surprising considering how many excellent Belgian Netflix Series exist. It’s a short (approx. 4 hours total) horror thriller that follows Rosa Steenwijk as she is inducted into an ultra secret society in Holland. Rosa, being a mixed-race middle-class medical student, is an oddity for Ares – a white Dutch upper class society that goes back many generations. The plot is slow moving (with the occasional gory murder) as Rosa quickly rises through the ranks of Ares as she uncovers its secrets, its past, and its monsters (figuratively and allegorically). I’m not a fan – its characters are self-centric, egotistical caricatures of the idle rich and those that want to emulate them. Rosa basically abandons her family (a schizophrenic mother and a hard-working father) in order to, as she puts it, “Win”. The killings are brutal, the overall atmosphere racist and sexist, and I found it hard to feel any sympathy or empathy with the main characters (with the exception of the monster, of course)