MR. & MRS. SMITH: Season One

Name: MR. & MRS. SMITH: Season One
Item: MR. & MRS. SMITH: Season One
Author: Lillie Jaenchen

"Heartless Spy Series"

Family Content: -4 Intentional blasphemy, evil, gross immorality, and/or worldview problems. (To be avoided)

Entertainment Quality:

	None	Light	Moderate	Heavy
Language
Violence
Sex
Nudity

Credits →

What You Need To Know:

MR. & MRS. SMITH is a romantic spy thriller series on Amazon Prime. Two lonely specialists sign up to become Mr. John and Mrs. Jane Smith, to work high risk jobs for an undisclosed, mysterious spy outfit. However, they get a bit more than they expected. As they take on missions like escorting a high profile target to safety or assassinations, John and Jane are faced with two facts. The faceless spy outfit paired them as a married mercenary team, and they’ve started developing real feelings for each other.

Based on characters from the 2005 movie, Season One of MR. & MRS. SMITH follows the approach of its action-fueled but heartless source material. Though its cinematography and action sequences are impressive, neither the characters nor the story go anywhere, other than down a deeper spiral into depravity and meaninglessness. The overall worldview is one of nihilism and romanticism with an ever so occasional biblical moral act. Season One of MR. & MRS. SMITH also has lots of strong foul language, gritty violence, sensuality, disturbing situations, and other objectionable and even abhorrent content.

Content:

(RoRoRo, HH, B, Ho, LL, VV, SS, AA, DD, MM):

Dominant Worldview and Other Worldview Content/Elements:

Very strong Romantic lawless worldview with strong humanist nihilism, some light moral, pro-marriage behavior, and brief homosexual reference in one episode;

Foul Language:

Episode 1.1 has nine obscenities (including four “f” words) and two profanities, there are roughly equal amounts in Episodes 1.2 and 1.4, but all other episodes have 10+ “f” words, in addition to other foul language;

Violence:

In Episode 1: A man is shot in the face and dies (hole in cheek and blood on face and floor); a woman is gunned down with an automatic weapon (impact with no blood); a man threatens another, knocking over his street stand, and threatening to beat him up; a bomb explodes that a couple unknowingly delivered and later it is revealed that it killed 9 people. Episode 2: A man and woman poison a man with too much truth serum; then they break the limbs of the corpse to fit it into a composter. Episode 3: A woman is kidnapped, and her husband tells them that they can kill her when they ask for ransom; a man kills several kidnappers with explicit headshots (blood splatters on windows, snow, other people). Episode 4: A man and woman are captured by guerillas in a jungle, and they kill the boss and others with a machete. Episode 5: Two people shoot and kill many assailants while escorting a man to safety in a prolonged street fight. Episode 6: sporadic flashbacks including some violent episodes. Episode 7: A woman holds another at gun point, the woman gets free and attacks her and her partner, wrapping a constricting cord around the man’s neck, while he tries to get it off, the women fight hand to hand, the woman escapes, and the other cuts the cord off her partner where it had begun to cut into his throat (some blood on neck). Episode 8: One long battle between husband and wife in which they use firearms of all kinds, knifes, house tools, and hand to hand combat to try and kill each other; a man injects his wife and himself with a mind altering drug; a woman shoots a man in the eye (no blood shown); a woman tries to kill another woman, but the outcome of this fight is uncertain;

Sex:

In one episode, a man tries to get a man and woman to have sexual relations with him watching by telling them to pretend to be dogs, in another a man who is trying to recover from hypothermia says he can’t feel his penis, and a woman rubs him to help, then he asks her to have oral sex with him, multiple sex scenes involving the two title characters, a man talks about giving a woman oral sex in a very crass way, a man and woman lie on the floor of their brownstone kissing each other after he injects them with “truth serum”;

Nudity:

A painting of a fully nude female in a museum shows full frontal nudity for an extended period of time, some nude artwork in a few other scenes, and blurred nudity on a pornographic website;

Alcohol Use:

In Episode 4, two couples get tipsy and drunk together before two are supposed to go on a mission together;

Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse:

No smoking but people use “truth serum” on a target, and man injects his wife and himself with a mind altering drug called “truth serum”; and,

Miscellaneous Immorality:

The main characters are assassins who don’t know the nature of whom they’re working for and both signed up to be “married” before either is remotely ready for such a commitment.

More Detail:

MR. & MRS. SMITH is a romantic spy thriller streaming on Amazon Prime. Two lonely specialists sign up to become spies in an arranged marriage with the new names Mr. John and Mrs. Jane Smith. Although they chose to work high risk jobs for an undisclosed employer, they get a bit more than they expected, not only as spies, but also as a newly married couple.

As they take on missions like escorting a high-profile target to safety or assassinations, John and Jane are faced with an uncomfortable fact. Although the faceless company paired them as a “man and wife” mercenary team, they’ve begun to develop real feelings for each other. What will they do as they face the pressures of their high risk career choices as well as the equally high risk challenges of marriage?

Based on characters from the 2005 movie of the same name, the series follows the approach of its action-fueled but heartless source material. As with any story, it’s difficult to be excited about it without someone to cheer. Following the adventures of John and Jane is a rather bland affair. This is because it’s only rarely that one detects even a modicum of morality or any redeeming qualities in this leading couple.

The show’s cinematography and action sequences are impressive. Yet, it’s hard to get over that neither the characters nor the story seems to be heading anywhere, other than down a deeper spiral into depravity and meaninglessness. The series is very quirky and its slow build in some episodes can be somewhat relaxing, like British television. However, it’s also a darkly macabre tale whose awkwardness in isolated segments are often disturbing. The series also becomes abhorrent in places, such as when the two accidentally poison someone, break the corpse’s limbs, stuff it into a composter, and then try to get over this horror by watching cartoons and having sexual relations.

Finally, it’s hard to see that the series is headed in any discernible positive direction throughout the course of its eight episodes. Character development is nonexistent as two very broken human beings show no signs of improvement from episode to episode. Overall, MR. & MRS. SMITH is ultimately nihilistic but shiny cinematic dreck.

The overall worldview is one of nihilism and humanist romanticism with an ever so occasional biblical moral act. Said another way, the show is a strange mix of espionage, humanist romance and violence with a thick layer of postmodern nihilism slathered onto the narrative skeleton. Characters are almost always unprincipled, if not felons, murderers or worse. Worst of all, as mentioned earlier, the leading two characters are simply two very broken people who show no signs of moral improvement throughout the course of Season One. Many episodes have strong violence with intense fighting, firearm impact and blood splatter, sequences of sexual depravity, and lots of strong foul language. So, MOVIEGUIDE® thinks media-wise viewers will want to avoid Amazon Prime’s MR. & MRS. SMITH series.

Watch MR. & MRS. SMITH: Season One →

Quality:

- Content: -4