TV Series Notebook: The Mosquito Coast.

"The Mosquito Coast" (Apple TV+), political action/drama, based on the 1981 novel of the same name by Paul Theroux. The book coaxed me to watch the 1986 film, which starred Harrison Ford. The much-better made 1988 movie "Running on Empty" by directed by Sidney Lumet, treads a similar story. Those two movies could be accompanying watch later.

THE TV series, starring Justin Theroux and Melissa George as the fugitive Fox couple Allie and Margot, is on Second Season.

       I first read the book in the 1990s but although my memory sometimes fails me, I am sure the "...based on" kicker took so much liberty that the series doesn't seem like what/how it was. Understandably, cellphones were not a thing then so in a significant sequence I didn't get that Allie was working on floppy discs for a cartel dude. And, of course, absence computer technology in the novel and presence of it in the series totally subverts plotpoints.

       Anyhow, acting by the main characters is remarkable but additional fist-bump to Logan Polish as Dina, the tormented and confused daughter. She ably filled the holes of Gabriel Bateman's sparse performance as brother Charlie.

       However, I am sure the best chapters of the source material were either left out or diminished in favor of circuitous plot twists. Still, the story of a counterculture couple on the run from the FBI, and how their two kids start to break out of this fugitive lifestyle remains as the gist of this journey.

       And so let's leave Paul's novel behind and focus on nephew (yes!) Justin's series as though this is an original "...Mosquito Coast" and hope that the languid, sometimes sermonizing tact evolves into a thrilling ride with a deep political bite. Hoping.