TV and Film Reviews

Why You Should Watch ‘The Knick’, Now That It’s On HBO Max

By: John Maescher

Any great show needs a great opening. Think about The Wire laying out its entire thesis as Jimmy McNulty questions a murder witness; think about an almost-naked Walter White speeding an RV through the desert in Breaking Bad’s adrenaline rush of an opener; think about Mad Men subtly but perfectly introducing Don Draper’s mystery and intrigue as he discusses cigarettes with a bartender. Many shows don’t truly find their footing until several episodes into their run, but it’s those first few minutes that are crucial to at least giving viewers a taste of what they can expect down the road.

The Knick, Cinemax’s criminally overlooked drama that aired two seasons from 2014 to 2015, tightens its grip from the first frame and doesn’t let go until that second season is over. The first thing we see is a pair of white shoes directly in the center of the frame, the orange-hued background a blur. A title card reads “New York City, 1900”. We’re in a seedy Chinatown brothel. Our main character, Dr. John Thackery (Clive Owen), is woken up by an escort, emerging from a sleep-and-opium-induced daze. Cut to Thackery entering a carriage. As he gets in, we see out onto the dirt road, lined with carriages and period-accurate stores. Over the soundtrack plays...pulsating electronic synths. Not the kind of music one would normally associate with the period, but Cliff Martinez’s score works wonders. As the synths continue to throb, Thackery shoots cocaine between his toes. Next thing we know, we’re in an operating theater, as Thackery and a team of doctors perform a C-section in front of a watchful audience. Luminous shades of white—on the walls, on the doctors’ clothing—contrast directly with the bright shades of red from the buckets of blood spilled in the operation. Neither the woman nor the child survives. The scene is graphic and uncompromising. Another tragedy directly follows (I won’t spoil it here), and with that, The Knick is off and running.

Sounds heavy, right? It is. But one of the many wonders of The Knick is that, for a show so permeated with death, it feels more alive and energetic than arguably anything else on TV over the last decade. For that, we have Oscar-winning director Steven Soderbergh (Ocean’s Eleven and its sequels, Out of Sight, Magic Mike) to thank. Soderbergh directed every one of The Knick’s twenty episodes, and his knack for visual experimentation and kinetic camerawork lends The Knick a quality unlike any other show in recent memory. Of Soderbergh’s many films, The Knick has less in common with the Ocean’s trilogy than it does with Contagion, which takes a similarly clinical, realistic and harrowing approach to illness (Contagion’s score, also composed by Martinez, feels very much like a predecessor to The Knick’s soundscape as well). But Soderbergh’s camera is always moving (literally; he shot it handheld), always taking a different approach to each scene. Add in the immaculate period detail—some of the most transportive and evocative I’ve ever seen—and The Knick looks, sounds, moves, and feels like nothing else on TV. Despite the wince-worthy gore and viscera frequently on display, the show is never anything less than thrilling to watch.

Putting aside the technical prowess, what’s on The Knick’s pages is just as great. The basic premise follows New York City’s Knickerbocker Hospital and its doctors, in a time on the cusp of change, both medicinal and societal. The aforementioned Thackery is the de facto protagonist, but The Knick is really an ensemble show, consisting of a variety of compelling and multi-layered characters. Dr. Algernon Edwards (André Holland) is a Black doctor fresh off a tenure in Paris, who, after being turned down work at the Knick, starts up his own operation to help out the city’s Black residents in a basement underneath the hospital. Herman Barrow (Jeremy Bobb) is the hospital’s crooked administrator, skimming off the hospital’s money to pay off his debts to mobsters and brothels. Lucy Elkins (Eve Hewson) is a nurse from West Virginia who gets close with Thackery. Cornelia Robertson (Juliet Rylance) is the daughter of the hospital’s Board of Directors leader, and also serves as the head of the hospital’s social welfare office (she’s also an old friend of Edwards’). The bench goes even deeper than that—there’s Tom Cleary (Chris Sullivan), an ambulance driver who steals jewelry from cadavers; Sister Harriet (Cara Seymour), a nun who strikes up a friendship with Cleary; and many more.

Like many shows, The Knick has some shortcomings early on. Initially, Thackery feels like just another variation on the antihero protagonist so prevalent in the cable dramas of the past 20 years, beginning with The Sopranos. Thackery’s brilliance as a surgeon contrasts with his blatant racism and drug addiction, and he fits right into the antihero trope that’s lost its novelty over the years. However, Owen is fantastic in the role, and manages to overcome the deficiencies of the character early on. As time goes on, creators Jack Amiel and Michael Begler improve the show further by putting greater focus on the larger ensemble. Instead of the main attraction, Thackery becomes just a part of the deep bench of great characters populating the hospital walls (although an instrumental one).

For a show that takes place 120 years in the past, The Knick always feels strikingly modern. The pulse of Martinez’s synths and the vibrancy of Soderbergh’s filmmaking may seem anachronistic for the period, but they act as perfect complements to what’s going on in the story. The world of medicine is undergoing radical changes, and Thackery is fully devoted to innovation and rolling the ball forwards. Of course, what was innovative in 1900 is commonplace in 2021, but these characters aren’t living in 2021. Viewed through a modern lens, the surgical procedures depicted on the show seem downright barbaric and primitive, but to the characters performing them, they were cutting-edge and groundbreaking. Back then, the life expectancy was only around 40, and chances were higher of dying during surgery than making it out alive. And The Knick pulls no punches in depicting these procedures in graphic, painstaking detail. Soderbergh lingers on the gore and viscera to a point that should make even the most hardened viewers squirm in their seats, and the effects work is incredibly realistic and nauseating (one storyline involving a nose destroyed by syphilis is particularly ugly). But even though these scenes may be unpleasant to watch, they’re not gratuitous; rather, they’re an accurate reflection of the times. Soderbergh includes them to drive home how different medicine was back then, and how far it’s come in the century since. Watching it, you’ll be grateful that you don’t live in those times. Still, though, squeamish viewers have been warned.

It’s a shame that The Knick got relegated to a network like Cinemax, and suffered from low viewership ratings as a result (most people just don’t have Cinemax). Critics loved the show, but The Knick largely flew under the radar last decade, with an average of only around 240,000 viewers in each of its seasons, leading Cinemax to cancel it prematurely in 2015 (don’t worry, though; the second season still ends satisfyingly). However, six years after its cancellation, it’s been confirmed to be returning for a third season, with Moonlight director Barry Jenkins to replace Soderbergh in the director’s chair (Soderbergh will still be an executive producer). It’ll be airing on HBO instead of Cinemax, and Soderbergh has confirmed that the first episode has already been written. The Knick’s first two seasons were added to HBO Max a few weeks ago, and hopefully this leads to the show finally getting the wide recognition it deserves. Its unique filmmaking, multi-layered characters, and frank and nuanced handling of social issues lend The Knick a high spot in the pantheon of great dramas from the past decade, and it’s all there on HBO Max at your fingertips.