TV Show Review: The Company You Keep

Stars: 4 out of 5

Pros: Addicting story with characters we want to root for

Cons: Charlie and his family; a few things that didn’t work for me, but minor overall

The Bottom Line:

Con and an agent

Pair up for a fun series

Enjoyed what we got

“Now Tell Me Something True.”

I was intrigued as soon as I heard about The Company You Keep, a TV show that ABC aired in the first half of 2023.  I thought it sounded promising, and they were heavily advertising that it was starring Milo Ventimiglia, and actor I’ve enjoyed in a couple of shows now.  I’ll admit, it took a couple of weeks for me to get fully invested in the show, but once I did, I was hooked.

When we first meet Charlie (Milo Ventimiglia), he is completing a business deal.  It just so happens, that the business deal is with Patrick Maguire (Timothy V. Murphy), the leader of a drug syndicate.  Oh, and Charlie happens to be a con artist, who has just taken Maguire for $10 million.  That is, until his fiancée double crosses him and takes the money for herself, leaving Charlie alone in a hotel bar.

Meanwhile, we meet Emma (Catherine Haena Kim), a CIA agent who is hot on the trail of a new drug trafficker.  However, her day ends when she is called to a hotel in time to catch her boyfriend cheating on her.  They break up, and Emma finds herself in the hotel bar where she sits next to Charlie.  After a few drinks, the two of them head up to the room that Charlie had booked for himself and his fiancée before she took off.

Eventually, the two have to return to the real world where Charlie finds out that Maguire is now after him and his family to return not only the money that they stole from him, but even more.  That means that Charlie is going to have to keep in touch with Maguire and his syndicate.  Meanwhile, Emma’s drug target?  Maguire, of course.  Will the two of them be able to build their relationship?  Or will their real jobs drive them apart?

Normally, I don’t find myself rooting for criminals.  And yes, I knew that Charlie was a con artist before I started watching the show.  That was my biggest hang up with the show in its first couple of episodes even while I found myself rooting for Charlie and his family to complete their cons, get money for Maguire, and avoid being spotted by Emma.  Emma, meanwhile, has her own family drama to deal with, and that helped me get to know her better.

But it only took a couple of episodes before I was fully on board.  I loved these characters.  It helped that Charlie and his family were targeting bad guys, so we had some Robin Hood vibes going on.  And all of the characters feel very real.  Even those that start out cliches (like Emma’s family) become more real as we get to know them.

It certainly helps that there are some wonderful twists and turns to the story.  I expected some of them from the pilot, but the timing and fall out was always a surprise.  While I didn’t always feel like the characters were behaving in realistic ways (or at least in ways I’d behave), these were minor issues as the writers did a good job of moving us quickly into more believable behavior.

Ultimately, this was a slick show, with a fast pace and lots of fun fantasy with the world the characters inhabited.  Was it really realistic?  Probably not.  Was it a fun show to escape into?  Absolutely.

That is helped by the characters.  The writers put them through a lot, and the actors rose to every challenge.  Even when the behavior didn’t feel quite true to me, the actors did their best to sell it, which is probably why I was able to move on quickly.

And the stunts and other technical aspects of the production were flawless.  There are lots of perfectly timed misses that I just loved watching.

Season 1 only consisted of 10 episodes.  Fortunately, the main storyline we were following was wrapped up satisfactorily here, although the final episode definitely set up places for the story to go if it had been renewed.  Unfortunately, the ratings were poor almost the entire way through the show’s run, so it wasn’t a surprise that it was cancelled.  I would have been back for more if it had been renewed.

The show was quickly pulled from streaming as well, so it will be hard to track down to watch.  However, if you run across it, I think you’ll get caught up in the fun that was The Company You Keep.