The Burbs Review
Director: Rachel Goldberg, Yana Gorskaya and Nzingha Stewart
Date Created: 2026-02-09 20:31
1.5
The Burbs Review: Created by Celeste Hughey and inspired by Dana Olsen’s 1989 cult classic, arrives on Peacock in eight episodes. Every episode is roughly 30 to 35 minutes long. Keke Palmer headlines as Samira, with a supporting cast that includes Jack Whitehall, Julia Duffy, Paula Pell, Mark Proksch, and Kapil Talwalkar. The series will transport you into a pristine suburban neighbourhood where Samira and her family relocate to her husband’s hometown, only to find that the peaceful cul-de-sac is riddled with secrets, rumours, and past resentments.
The Burbs Review
The ‘Burbs series clearly brands itself as a dark comedy with murder mystery elements, clearly targeting the recent trend of cosy murder mysteries and true crime comedies. On the face of it, the series has a familiar but viable concept: nosy neighbours, dark secrets, and the creepy notion that danger could be lurking behind perfectly manicured lawns. However, as the series wears on, it is evident that Peacock’s The Burbs simply lacks enough substance to support its episodic structure.
Perhaps the most glaring issue is that the mystery at the heart of the series is actually paper-thin. Rather than building towards a crescendo, the series finds itself stalling its own momentum regularly. The series is filled with dialogue, bickering, and subplots that rarely advance the plot in any meaningful way. The series is constantly teasing, stalling, and restarting its own mystery, giving the illusion of complexity without actually providing any.
In terms of tone, The Burbs series is unable to find its footing. It clearly wants to be a satire of suburban culture, a commentary on community politics, and a lighthearted murder mystery all at once. Unfortunately, these elements never quite come together. The series’ comedy is often flat, relying on over-the-top characters instead of sharp writing. When the series tries to dip its toes into more serious waters, it quickly pulls back, creating a weirdly subdued viewing experience that is neither funny nor exciting enough to make a lasting impact.
The series’s pacing does nothing to help this problem. Eight episodes are far too many for a story that could have been told in a much shorter amount of time. Much of the series’s runtime is spent on subplots that add nothing to the emotional or thematic resonance of the series. Rather than adding depth to the world of the neighbourhood, these elements serve to dilute the sense of urgency that the series is trying to create.
Overall, Keke Palmer is the best anchor of the show. She has real energy and charm that shines through even in the more boring parts. There are times when her acting makes you almost believe that the show has more pizzazz than it actually does. However, she is surrounded by characters who seem to have been written and developed in an unbalanced manner. Jack Whitehall’s Rob appears to be emotionally dull, and Paula Pell’s character tends to go into annoying rather than comedic territory. The rest of the cast seems to blend into the background, leaving little impact.
The social issues addressed by The Burbs that pertain to suburbia (such as social classes, ethnicity, and class politics) seem applicable to today’s world. Although a viewer may agree that the issues being dealt with in The Burbs are still relevant, these subjects do not go much further than setting up what is necessary for each basic premise of an episode or as part of a story arc as it relates to The Burbs.
The social commentary seems to be of inadequate quality and carries little weight, and therefore does not appear to have been created to correspond to any identifiable theme, but was rather created as a type of “check-off” list of subjects to discuss during the show’s run.
The final twists did not provide enough of a payoff for all of the time spent watching. Instead of leaving you with a feeling of satisfaction or excitement, I simply felt bored. A viewer has been asked to have patience with this show, but in the end, there is nothing meaningful returned for that time spent, and therefore, no connection can be made from an emotional perspective.
Peacock The Burbs Review: Summing Up
In conclusion, The Burbs 2026 contains an interesting premise and has a good lead; however, it suffers from poor pacing, an imbalance of tone, and an excessive number of episodes, which ultimately contribute to this show being a loud, repetitive, and largely uninspired watch, one that struggles to justify why this story needed to be told in this format at all.
