Just shy of one year since Amazon Prime released the first season of Cross, the show is already back for its second instalment.
Based on a series of crime novels from James Patterson, the Washington DC-set copper crusade stars Aldis Hodge as the preternaturally gifted homicide detective Alex Cross.
In a role that has also been played by Martin Freeman and Tyler Perry in prior films, Cross also dabbles as a forensic psychologist – allowing him to Mindhunter-style get inside the heads of killers – and has some requisite detective-style baggage to deal with.
With twisty plotting that fans of Patterson will be acquainted with, the show rises above your bog-standard crime drama with an underlying theme on the experience of being a Black police officer in America.
The first season saw Cross on the hunt for a sadistic serial killer as he investigated the murder of a prominent Black Lives Matter activist.
This time around, Cross is charged with making sure no harm comes to the philanthropic agro-tech billionaire Lance Durand, played by Matthew Lillard of Scooby Doo and Scream fame.
In what sounds a touch like it’s been ripped from the headlines, Durand’s life is in very real danger after a vigilante starts targeting America’s corrupt elite class.
But this isn’t an easy task for Cross, who has very little (if anything) in common with his ward Durand. ‘Cross is about two seconds from putting his hands on him,’ actor Hodge told TV Insider in an interview.
‘He can’t let his bias affect his business, but when that business is done, he might have some different thoughts on that.’
The showrunner Ben Watkins has teased that this second season sees them ‘push the envelope’, telling the publication: ‘We have not really gotten to the edge yet.’
The first three episodes of the eight-part season just dropped on Wednesday, but Cross is already trending on Amazon Prime as viewers binge away.
What other shows can you stream on Amazon Prime now?
- Memory of a Killer. Patrick Dempsey stars as a later-in-life hitman who begins to develop dementia.
- Steal. A six-episode heist thriller sees ordinary office worker Zara (Sophie Turner) get caught up in the heist of the century.
- Legion. A Marvel product that managed to take the capes and tights confines and reinvent them.
It’s probably no surprise given that the show was labelled ‘gritty, smart and addictive’ by viewers of the first season, who took to IMDb after it dropped to share their write-ups.
One fan wrote: ‘Cross on Prime Video is easily one of the best crime thrillers I’ve seen in years – period… The storytelling is tight, bold, and full of twists.’
While some noted that the show seemed to have been filmed without adequate lighting for all the scenes – something that other dramas like House of the Dragon have fallen victim to – another reviewer said the show is ‘one of the best crime dramas in a while’.
They wrote: ‘What stood out to me most is how the show explores deeper themes… It’s not just about solving murders; it’s about what those murders reveal about society and about Cross himself. That made it way more engaging than your average detective show.’
Will you be watching Cross on Amazon Prime?
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Definitely
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Not one for me
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I'm undecided
The first three episodes of Cross season 2 are available to stream on Amazon.
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