Harlan Coben’s The Woods – Netflix Mini-Series Review

Harlan Coben’s THE WOODS is a new Netflix mini-series. It’s a Polish production so the story has been moved to Poland, but it works perfectly. Especially since the casting and acting are spot-on and the production quality is amazing. Read our full The Woods review here!

Harlan Coben’s THE WOODS is a Netflix mini-series from Poland. Basically, Harlan Coben wrote a story about Paul Copeland who is now Pawel Kopinski, since the story plays out in Poland instead of the US.

The mini-series has just six episodes (each under one hour) and we’ve watched the entire mini-series for the purpose of writing this review. Actually, we finished the series because it’s really good.

Continue reading our The Woods review below.

Another gorgeous Netflix production from Poland

I have never been one for seeking out movies or TV series from Poland. Honestly, I just never expected them to have any particularly high quality. I was very wrong!

We’ve watched a few movies and TV series from Poland on Netflix now and they always seem to exceed any expectations we had ahead of watching them. The Netflix series The Mire was probably the first one, that truly opened our eyes to the production quality.

Recommended reading: Do check out our review of the Polish Netflix series The Mire here >

Then came the movie The Plagues of Breslau, which really blew my mind. I mean, this movie is just screaming for a US remake with this awesome plot. Again, I didn’t have any huge expectations, but it really is worth watching.

Don’t miss: Our review of the serial killer movie The Plagues of Breslau here >

Finally, we went into The Woods now with much higher expectations. Once again, they were both met and exceeded. Both in terms of production quality, character development, and the overall story.

Several familiar faces in The Woods mini-series

I never really expect to know many of the actors in a Polish production. However, for The Woods, I found myself recognizing several faces. Not that this is necessary to enjoy the series, but it just might help with getting more people to watch it.

The adult version of the lead character, Pawel Kopinski, is portrayed by Grzegorz Damiecki. He’s in the HBO Europe series Wataha and he was in Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List (1993). I should also make sure to mention that anti-semitism is a big part of the storyline in The Woods. It’s tough, but realistic, and covered in a very sober and important way.

Jacek Koman is another actor with a very recognizable and familiar face – to me anyway. He’s been in international hit movies such as Moulin Rouge (2001) and Children of Men (2006) along with series like Top of the Lake and Tidelands. The same goes for Agnieszka Grochowska who was in Child 44 (2015) the intense thriller series Sanctuary (2019-).

Watch Harlan Coben’s The Woods on Netflix

The Woods is based on a novel by Harlan Coben while a strong team of screenwriters has adapted it for this mini-series. Among these writers are Wojciech Miloszewski and Michael Armbruster. While Wojciech Miloszewski has written on the HBO series Wataha (2014-), Michael Armbruster most recently wrote End of Sentence (2019).

For most people, however, the reason for watching The Woods is the fact that it’s based on a Harlan Coben novel. Myself included. Still, I do also have to mention the extremely impressive level of production quality that we’ve come to expect from Netflix productions from Poland.

You might like our review of Harlan Coben’s The Stranger >

Except for a different language being spoken, you really cannot see that this isn’t any UK or US production. It’s impressive and should certainly be enough to give this series a shot. If you do, you will definitely be rewarded since it’s both challenging and entertaining. Also, it should keep you guessing until the very end.

This Netflix mini-series has just six 45-minute episodes and you should be hooked after the first episode.

The Woods is out on Netflix globally from June 12, 2020.

Details

Directors: Leszek Dawid, Bartosz Konopka
Stars: Grzegorz Damiecki, Agnieszka Grochowska, Hubert Milkowski, Wiktoria Filus, Wiktor Debski, Jacek Koman, Pawel Gabor, Marcin Lipski