This is obviously a personal choice, and being a functioning human being with kids, website and a football club to support, I’ve not seen them all… But for me, the best Amazon Prime Originals series is Goliath.
And it’s not only me who thinks it’s outstanding, as I’ll prove shortly.
What’s Goliath about?
Goliath is a tale of a Scotch-soaked lawyer (Billy Bob Thornton), who takes a case against the huge law firm that fired him. It’s Billy vs Goliath, hence the title.
The law firm is orchestrated by Donald Cooperman (William Hurt), who runs the place from a dimly lit penthouse lair. At first, it’s not immediately obvious why an enormous law firm has forgotten to put 50 cents in the meter so the governor can see who he’s invoicing, but it transpires the lights are dimmer than a Love Island contestant because he’s had half his face melted down in a fire.
Despite a visog like a shrinkwrapped gammon steak, Cooperman has no trouble bedding half of the most attractive women in his firm, whom he monitors from a bank of television screens in his office. (That noise you can hear is the lawyers for Sliver rubbing their hands). Cooperman’s hit rate with the ladies is certainly nothing to do with a GSOH, but down to his utter puppet-master-like bastardry, played with a tremendous dollop of menace by Hurt.
Inevitably, Hurt and Thornton end up facing off (if you’ll excuse the expression) in court, by which time you’re seven hours into a streaming marathon, interrupted only by your wife trying to get the kids to school.
It’s not only me who was mesmerised by Thornton’s dry-wit deadpanning and Hurt’s nocturnal menace. Goliath has an average rating of 8.3 out of 10 on IMDb. And if you’re suspicious of Amazon-owned IMDb ratings, it racked up an audience rating of 91% on Rotten Tomatoes.
There’s a second series coming soon, too, so now’s a cracking time to get going on the first.
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