Way back there in 1989, The ‘Burbs was a Tom Hanks litmus test after the juggernaut breakout success of Big a year earlier. Director Joe Dante was deep into his own run of successes like Gremlins and the series Amazing Stories and a Twilight Zone reboot. What I recall at the time was that the ensemble movie was ridiculously unhinged and so much better than it had any right to be as it followed the antics of a small group of neighbors who were certain that had a murderer in their midst.
Now, 27 years later, Peacock is plumbing parent company Universal’s IP with an eight-episode series adaptation headlined by Keke Palmer. Entering a field where Only Murders in the Building is the current standard bearer, the mystery dramedy pays homage to the OG film by shooting on the very same street on the same backlot at Universal Studios.
In this new iteration of The ‘Burbs, Palmer is Samira, a litigation attorney on maternity leave who moves with her husband Rob (Jack Whitehall), a book editor, and their baby boy, Miles, to the picture-perfect Ashfield Place in Hinkley Hills, the suburban bedroom community where he grew up. They take up residence in his parents’ home after they depart for a time-share cruise and hand over the keys.
As Rob heads back to the city to work, commuting with his childhood and current bestie Naveen (Kapil Talwalkar), Samira tries to settle in, but she’s distinctly unsettled by the eyesore abandoned Victorian across the street. Rob is cagey about discussing it, but she slowly gleans some clues as she wears him down.
She finds kindred spirits in a small subsection of her cul-de-sac neighbors. Lynn (Julia Duffy) is recently widowed and has been on the block for 15 years; Dana (Paula Pell) is retired military with a wife currently deployed to parts unknown, and Tod (Mark Proksch) is a man of few words but a keen observer. They invite Samira into their inner circle and soon prove themselves fast friends when they close ranks to protect her after she’s racially profiled. Although it knocks her out of unexpected idyll, she decides to stay.
When the Victorian is quickly listed and sold, Samira and her newfound friends try to suss out who the new owner Gary (Justin Kirk) is, just as they try to unravel a series of mysteries about missing and murdered residents. It’s a fun whodunnit that’s not as hijinks-heightened as the film. It keeps things mostly tonally light despite the murder of it all while also leaning heavily into the “not everything that glitters is gold” and the lengths people will go to to preserve the mirage.
Palmer is solid as our POV into disturbia (and yes, the Rihanna song gets airplay here before it’s all said and done), rocking a gleeful assortment of jackets, sweaters, and kicks that I immediately Googled. It’s very fun to see Duffy play a role that we think is going to be one thing and is not at all that as Lynn becomes Samira’s closest ally.
The ensemble is great across the board — I love Duffy and Pell as unlikely besties – and I love that like OMITB, the series is anchored by multigenerational friendships that wouldn’t have happened under normal circumstances. Here, they do, as Samira’s arrival and curiosity wakes them all up from their suburban HOA coma.
The series was created, produced, and written by Celeste Hughey, who’s written and produced on other women-centric series like Palm Royale (which Duffy is also in) and Dead to Me. Points to Peacock for launching two series in a row (after PONIES) that are female-led and female-driven.
The ‘Burbs drops all eight episodes of the first season at 3:01 am ET on Sunday on Peacock, so you can binge to your heart’s content if neither the Olympics nor the Super Bowl are your jam this weekend. Here’s a sneak peek.
Photos courtesy of Elizabeth Morris/PEACOCK; video courtesy of PEACOCK.
