UPDATE: The Serpent will be available on Netflix on April 4.
Netflix just released its own trailer for the show:
One of the best shows to come out this year, according to us, is ‘The Serpent’. It’s a TV BBC drama series that is very well-made with an interesting storyline and features actors who know their craft. ‘The Serpent’ is the story of Charles Sobhraj, the megalomaniac psycho who had a penchant for conning, drugging, killing and stealing from backpackers.
Though this is a series based on a murderer, the makers do a good job of not glamorizing Charles Sobhraj. The only glamour here is the way the actors are dressed, especially the characters of Monique and Charles.
French actor Tahar Rahim plays Charles Sobhraj and British actress Jenna Coleman plays Charles’ companion, Monique. Amesh Edireweera plays Charles’ partner in crime, Ajay Chowdhury. They are so good in the show that you will feel scared watching the series. Charles is just something else! The way he easily manipulates people. It’s like they are scared of him and just do as he says. You have to see it to believe it.
On one hand, there are the bad people and on the other, there are the good ones who went out of their way to bring Charles down. Starting with the Dutch diplomat and his wife, the couple who lived in Charles’ building, and a foreign officer.
Another reason we wanted to tell this story the way we have: to find these young men and women in the life they were living before they met Sobhraj and, in whatever small way we can, reclaim them for who they were: wide-eyed kids who went looking for adventure and instead found a monster waiting. It’s to all those brave young intrepids that we now dedicate the work. – Richard Warlow, writer
The show starts off in Bangkok then goes to India, Paris and Nepal. There are Indian actors featured on the show, mostly playing Nepali characters. It’s based in the 1970s when forging passports and faking identities was easy, and the lives of backpackers didn’t matter. Some scenes might appear shocking and unbelievable to you, especially the ones involving the naive Monique, but it’s all true. Not just Monique, it’s frustrating watching all these silly women fawn over him!
Check out the trailer of ‘The Serpent’
‘The Serpent’ is multilingual since the characters in the film come from France, India, Nepal, Thailand and Netherlands. Though these are the locations supposedly depicted in the episodes, the series had to be moved to a place in Hertfordshire, UK, called Tring since the lockdown in 2020 made it impossible for the cast and crew to go to Kabul, Bangkok, Paris, Mumbai and Delhi. They did manage to shoot some parts in Thailand before the pandemic happened.
What’s amazing about this story is the length that these characters went to just to find justice and put this man behind bars. All because they cared about the people that Charles conned and murdered, compared to the authorities who didn’t give a damn at the beginning. The people involved in putting Charles in jail and making him pay for his crime have destroyed their marital homes in the process. There are two couples involved bringing justice and both of them separated soon after in the 80s.
The old creep Charles is happy in jail where he is considered a celebrity and given a star treatment compared to the other inmates. The old man even has a 20-something silly girl who is that stupid to fall in love with him! He must be a really great charmer!
We mentioned above how scared you will get as you watch the series, but even though it’s a show about a murderer, they don’t show any actual killing on the show. There’s no physical depiction of something disturbing happening, it’s all in the way they act and talk.
Randeep Hooda as Charles Sobhraj
Years ago, a reader recommended Randeep Hooda’s ‘Main Aur Charles’ as the film to watch out for. ‘Main Aur Charles’ is the first official Hindi film about Charles Sobhraj and in that film, Randeep Hooda played Charles. Upon recommendation, we did see that film back then but we don’t remember much about it. It wasn’t as impressive and if you see it and then compare it with the BBC version, you will see. One of the reasons is the budget that BBC invested in ‘The Serpent’ which is bigger than the Indian film and the other is, the professionals and the talented people working on this show. Again, you can see the difference in both trailers.
Funny that Randeep went to meet Charles in jail and was impressed with his looks, Randeep said: “He is 72 years old but he is still very handsome, I felt.” Didn’t Randeep play him in the film? It’s stupid to say something like that when the man is a psycho murderer. It’s weird that you go and meet such a crazy murderer in jail and his looks are what impress you the most!
Tahar, the actor who plays Charles in the BBC series, said he didn’t want to go and meet Charles in jail as he saw Charles as an animal, not a human being.
Catch ‘The Serpent’ on BBC or on Netflix.