Dope Thief Is A Repetitive Crime Thriller That Wastes Brian Tyree Henry’s Talents
Henry and Wagner Moira are the highlights of an overlong crime drama.
DEA agents Ray (Brian Tyree Henry) and Manny (Wagner Moira) have found their next target: A small drug cooking operation in North Philadelphia. Their raid is a little rough around the edges, but there's no doubt that Ray has done this dozens, if not hundreds of times. Oddly, despite handcuffing the young assailants, instead of arresting them, they take the money and run.
That’s because Ray and Manny aren't actually DEA agents. They're fraudsters, posing as officials of the law to make cash. It's a risky business, but it's carefully controlled. The pair targets small operations run by young people, and Ray justifies it as a net good for society, teaching kids that crime doesn't pay. That's patently absurd, of course, but it works for them, and they make enough to get by. It's a rocky foundation, one that crumbles completely when they target a meth lab in the countryside and inadvertently find themselves the targets of the people behind the biggest drug operation on the East Coast. Suddenly, Ray, Manny, and everyone they know are at extreme risk.
Dope Thief, created by Peter Craig (The Town, Top Gun: Maverick), struggles to fulfill the promise of its exciting premise. A high-stakes chase gets weighed down by a bevy of harsh black-and-white flashbacks that flesh out Ray's tough upbringing. We're continuously brought back to moments before the robbery in an effort to highlight what a big deal it is that Ray and Manny have attacked the wrong house — something that was already clear from the first episode. There's an overreliance on violence, and while the first few shootouts are tense and engaging, they start to lose their luster when you can all but guarantee there's at least one per episode.
Some impressive performers are locked into frustrating roles. Marin Ireland brings a ferocious determination to Mina, a no-nonsense undercover cop hellbent on revenge, and Kate Mulgrew brings a fun edge to Theresa, Ray's mother. But neither of these characters gets the opportunity to do much in a show that suffers under the weight of predictable plot threads and sluggish pacing. After a speedy first episode, Dope Thief can't sustain eight full hours, so to make up time it invests in Ray and Manny's pasts. The results vary but are largely frustrating, especially Ray’s relationship with his Dad (a game Ving Rhames) who is saddled with too much clunky dialogue to feel believable.
As Ray, Henry is sensational. It's a treat to see one of our great actors getting a character to really sink into. Watching Ray snap into focus as a fake DEA agent is spellbinding; it's immediately clear why he's so good at what he does, exerting masterful control and cocky swagger when he's in the zone. When things unravel, you can see Henry's eyes flicker as he tries to calculate his best chance of survival. The way Ray interacts with everyone in the cast is different, peppering in details of the kind of person Ray is, and the sort of man he strives to be. Henry gives so many sides to Ray, rounding him out as a complete character with dimension. Watching Ray try and make sense of his collapsing world is far more exciting than the endless glut of shootouts Dope Thief seems to prefer. Tyree wisely injects Ray with a sly sense of humor: When they get flanked in one firefight, Ray shouts “Manny get down, they all read Sun Tzu!” The other place the series shines is Ray and Manny’s friendship. Moura is terrific, and you immediately buy into their friendship. Their dynamic shifts considerably as the risks get higher and higher and their chances of survival decrease. Their friendship is the heart of Dope Thief, and while there are too many efforts to get away from them and into less vital proceedings, they are always electric.
Henry and Moura’s chemistry is the show’s greatest strength.
The most baffling part of Dope Thief is the implausible decision for Ray and Manny to stay put in Philly. There's never a convincing argument to have them stay in a place where the enemy is actively hunting them, and they've stolen more than enough cash to grant them a new life for themselves and their loved ones anywhere they choose. It's not like they live in paradise: North Philadelphia is rendered as a stiflingly grey landscape of abandoned buildings and weathered faces, making their decision to do anything but run all the more baffling.
Perhaps Dope Thief would have made for an excellent film. Instead, it's an eight-hour experience that repeats all too similar beats, shifting from one gunfight to the next. There are glimpses of what could have been, particularly in Henry and Moura’s performances. Brian Tyree Henry deserves a better series to showcase his talents.
