Gugu Mbatha-Raw stars in Apple TV+'s Surface as a woman with amnesia discovering her life isn't what it seems.

What if one day you woke up with no memories and the life you are living seems to be peculiar, like you are living in another person’s life? As one goes through their routines that were so normal before this moment, if one aspect of the routine is altered or messed up, everything will begin to seem irregular. Apple TV+’s Surface seeks out the mystery in this concept, as its protagonist finds herself without memories of what life was like before an accident. Suddenly everything feels wrong, and there are more questions than answers about why things are a certain way, whether it is a question of domestic abuse or why one has certain friends. Apple TV+ has been releasing a steady stream of thrillers and tense television series in 2022, so the hopes are high that this is the new Severance.

Surface was created as a miniseries by Veronica West (High Fidelity, Ugly Betty) for Apple TV+. Reese Witherspoon was one of the show’s executive producers, continuing her collaboration with the streaming platform beyond The Morning Show. Surface was ordered by the platform in November 2020. Filming began and was completed in the summer of 2021, and a year later, in the summer of 2022, the first episodes have been released. When Apple TV+ was initially released, its numbers were not doing well, but from 2021 to 2022, its catalog of shows has shown that Apple TV+ is a platform to keep an eye on. As Netflix stumbles with its numbers, Apple has been establishing itself as a leader in streaming with its original releases.

The cast of this show consists of some pretty spectacular names. Gugu Mbatha-Raw stars in the leading role of Sophie; fans may recognize her from the ongoing series Loki. Oliver Jackson-Cohen (Mr. Malcom’s List) is James, her supportive husband who may be who he seems at first glance. Stephan James (If Beale Street Could Talk) completes their love triangle as an undercover cop trailing Sophie and offers some major hints about what might be going on. The remainder of the cast is rounded out by Ari Graynor (The Sopranos), Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Secrets & Lies), François Arnaud (Midnight, Texas), and Millie Brady (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies).

Surface opens with the protagonist, Sophie, seemingly living a perfect life. She has a significant other who wanders over in the morning with a frying pan full of freshly cooked eggs and, as seen in the next sequence of events, has a job at the hospital along with a beautiful home. But the cracks begin to show almost immediately, exposing that not everything is as it seems on the surface. Sophie has amnesia and cannot remember anything about her life until now, and as a taxi driver attempts to drive her across the bridge, she has a meltdown and desperately flees the car. Her therapist suggests that the catalyst to all of her trauma is, perhaps, that she was suicidal, as she jumped out of a boat in the middle of the ocean seemingly deliberate and unprompted. This is what is consistently repeated throughout the show, that Sophie did this scary act, and no one knows why, and Sophie should accept the circumstances she is in right now and enjoy the perfect life she has. But she does not, as something feels off to her.

Now, it would not make for good television if that were the answer to all of the show’s worries and whims, so the story progresses and dives deeper into what happened here. “If my life was so perfect,” she asks herself, “why would I try to end it?” It is this suspicion, and the mystery behind why she supposedly tried to commit suicide, that leads her to comb through the relics of her past. With old text messages, medical records, and random flashbacks she gets during her everyday life, Sophie tries to piece together the truth of her accident. There is also that deep-seated mistrust embedded deep into Sophie’s interactions with friends and objects as things quickly do not start adding up. What her friends tell her, or what she finds in her house, clearly is not the truth. As she goes on a girls’ trip with her best friend, she asks about what she was like before the amnesia. Her friend is incapable of answering her question outside of vague words like “complicated” and “vague,” furthering Sophie’s suspicions.

In addition to this, Sophie’s therapist continues to repeat the same broken mantra in each of their sessions: Sophie needs to stop digging at the past and learn to move. Even as Sophie tries to say that she feels something is wrong about all of this, she is gaslit and told again and again that it was her fault, that she tried to commit suicide. Strangers offer insights into the reality of the situation: a Coast Guard officer Sophie meets while running says that when Sophie was rescued, she said a man pushed her, and her ID name, and what Sophie said her name was, were completely different. As the second male love interest, an undercover detective (Stephan James) that Sophie was having an affair with before the amnesia, further plants the seeds of distrust towards Sophie’s husband, so begins a game that moves forward at a snail’s pace.

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Music and cinematography play key roles in creating a nuanced story in Surface. Whether it is a cut to Sophie descending into the depths of the ocean during the most mundane scenes, like her running through the city, there are subtle reminders about what she went through and while she cannot remember it, it still haunts her in everything that she does. These smaller moments, such as a taxi going over a bridge or running through downtown and ending up at the ocean, add a more metaphorical meaning to the show's concept. Not everything is at the surface level. Sophie may have been physically beneath the water at one point, but mentally she is now still trapped beneath all of this.

Surface runs around in circles, relying on the mystery aspect of the story to try and generate interest. There is this reiteration that Sophie’s life is perfect, especially by the detective following her around, and that something is wrong. The unsettling feeling, merged with very direct gaslighting by therapists, friends, and even strangers, combined with the lush, provocative visuals of the world around her is compelling visually. During the first three episodes released, false answers are provided repeatedly, plunging Sophie—and the viewer—back into the deep, unclear end. It is this cycle of a question, answer, then debunking what we already know keeps the engine moving forward, albeit uncertainly.

Because of this, the pacing suffers. If one is not initially hooked on the premise or opening episode, there is not much to keep a viewer there. Surface has a lot more ground to cover to unveil the true story behind what has happened here, but it cannot keep running in circles for too much longer. However, there is one standout performance in the show: Gugu Mbatha-Raw. Mbatha-Raw has shown her prowess on Doctor Who, The Morning Show, and Black Mirror, but she truly owns the character of Sophie in Surface. Without a strong performance from the leading lady, Surface would fall flat. Her character is constantly on-camera, present in almost every shot except when the camera quickly cuts to another person, often positioned in a more dominant position, and that is fairly demanding.

Surface offers potential but can fall flat if it does not break free of the constraints it is already putting itself under. There is a solid chance from how the characters are positioned that viewers can easily predict how this is going to end, as blame is already being pinned on the partner and friend group that Sophie instinctually realizes that she has no legitimate connection. It is up to the viewer to decide whether this slow burn is worth it, even though it has all of the elements to make an interesting thriller: the love triangle, the amnesia, and an abundance of secrets to be discovered. “Sometimes I feel like I am running in circles,” Sophie even admits in therapy. Perhaps the show is self-aware by this point that it needs to “break the routine,” as her therapist suggests.

The first three episodes of Surface are available to stream exclusively on Apple TV+ as of July 29, 2022. The remaining episodes will be released weekly.

Writer, author, critic. Find me @ashleynassarine.