| Opentheme: | "Who by Fire" by Leonard Cohen, performed by PJ Harvey |
| Num Series: | 2 |
| Num Episodes: | 14 |
| Runtime: | 49–58 minutes |
| Language: | English |
| Network: | Apple TV+ |
Bad Sisters is an Irish black comedy television series developed by Sharon Horgan, Dave Finkel, and Brett Baer. Set in Dublin and filmed on location in Ireland, it is based on the Belgian series Clan, which was created by Malin-Sarah Gozin. The first two episodes aired on 19 August 2022. Apple TV+ renewed the series for a second season on 8 November 2022, [1] which started releasing episodes on 13 November 2024.[2]
The first season received a positive reception from critics and won a 2022 Peabody Award. It received a leading twelve nominations at the 19th Irish Film & Television Awards, winning four including Best Drama, and received the British Academy Television Award for Best Drama Series at the 2023 BAFTA Awards alongside two additional wins. Season 1 received four nominations at the 75th Primetime Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for Horgan.
The five Garvey sisters—Eva, Grace, Ursula, Bibi, and Becka—live in Dublin. After Grace's abusive, controlling husband John Paul dies unexpectedly, the sisters find themselves at the centre of a life insurance investigation. The series flips between timelines, one before John Paul's death, in which Grace's sisters plot to murder their brother-in-law and another after his death, in which a determined insurance agent tries to prove the sisters' malicious involvement to save his struggling business.
In September 2021, it was officially announced Sharon Horgan would co-write, produce and star in a series for Apple TV+ developed by her production company Merman. The series, which had a working title of Emerald, was an adaptation of the Belgian series Clan. Malin-Sarah Gozin, the creator of Clan, joined the project as an executive producer alongside Bert Hamelinck and Michael Sagol for the Belgian Caviar Films. Other producers were Faye Dorn and Clelia Mountford for Merman as well as Brett Baer and Dave Finkel.[3] The series was created as part of Horgan's Apple TV+ deal.[4]
The cast was initially believed to include Assaad Bouab, Eve Hewson, and Brian Gleeson in early reports.[5] The cast was later confirmed in March 2022, with Anne-Marie Duff, Eva Birthistle, and Sarah Greene, and Hewson set to star alongside Horgan. Claes Bang, Brian Gleeson, Daryl McCormack, Bouab, and Saise Quinn complete the ensemble.[6]
Principal photography for the first season took place in 2021. Cast and crew were reported filming in and around Dublin at locations such as Sandycove, the Forty Foot, Howth, and Malahide in August. They would also film in Belfast.[7]
The title sequence depicts a physical Rube Goldberg style machine made from dangerous objects and props from the show that foreshadow narrative elements in the main storyline.[8] The sequence was mostly hand-made, designed and made by Peter Anderson Studio.[9] [10] The theme music is a cover of Leonard Cohen's "Who by Fire" performed by PJ Harvey.[11]
The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 100% approval rating with an average rating of 8.3/10 for the first season, based on 61 critic reviews. The website's critics consensus reads, "Dark secrets are a family affair in Bad Sisters, a riotously funny murder mystery that makes fine use of its gifted ensemble while exemplifying creator and star Sharon Horgan's penchant for salty warmth."[12] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned a score of 79 out of 100 based on 22 critics, indicating "generally favourable reviews".[13] IndieWire graded it B and says:
Aside from a few minor red herrings, "Bad Sisters" sets a trajectory and sticks to it for much of the run. As a dramedy of errors, "Bad Sisters" doesn't always feel like the freshest or most elegant execution. But as a family showcase, the engine is there to power this show through an ordeal of any length.[14]
The Hollywood Reporter called it "Fun but Empty" and said:
...it's a bit of an oddity — easy to breeze through but a little too mordant to be sincere, a little too heavy to be hilarious, a little too sour to be purely fun.[15]
The Atlantic called it "a semi-comic murder caper" and said:
The setup of Bad Sisters is deliberately absurd, a throwback to sillier shows such as Desperate Housewives and Why Women Kill. The ease with which the Garvey sisters decide to kill John Paul, and their resoluteness when their attempts repeatedly and catastrophically fail, are pure fantasy.[16]
Variety said:
Bad Sisters is less about the mystery than its cutting, empathetic take on all the relationships that tangled into such an overwhelming knot along the way.[17]
For the second season the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 84% approval rating with an average rating of 6.9/10, based on 31 critic reviews. The website's critics consensus reads, "The return of Bad Sisters can't help but feel like too much of a good thing, but the lived-in dynamic between these outstanding performers continues to pay highly watchable dividends."[18] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned a score of 72 out of 100 based on 17 critics, indicating "generally favourable reviews".[19]
| Year | Award | Category | Nominee(s) | Result | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | Peabody Award | Entertainment | Bad Sisters | [20] | |
| Critics' Choice Television Awards | Best Drama Series | Bad Sisters | [21] | ||
| Best Actress in a Drama Series | Sharon Horgan | ||||
| Writers Guild of America Awards | New Series | Brett Baer, Dave Finkel, and Sharon Horgan | [22] | ||
| Episodic Drama | Sharon Horgan, Dave Finkel, and Brett Baer | ||||
| Royal Television Society Programme Awards | Writer – Drama | Sharon Horgan | [23] | ||
| British Academy Television Awards | Best Drama Series | Sharon Horgan, Dearbhla Walsh, Faye Dorn, Brett Baer, Dave Finkel, Johann Knobel | [24] | ||
| Best Supporting Actress | Anne-Marie Duff | ||||
| British Academy Television Craft Awards | Best Director: Fiction | Dearbhla Walsh | |||
| Best Scripted Casting | Nina Gold, Lucy Amos | ||||
| Best Titles & Graphic Identity | Peter Anderson Studio | ||||
| Hollywood Critics Association TV Awards | Best Streaming Series, Drama | Bad Sisters | [25] | ||
| Best Actress in a Streaming Series, Drama | Sharon Horgan | ||||
| Best Supporting Actress in a Streaming Series, Drama | Anne-Marie Duff | ||||
| Eve Hewson | |||||
| Hollywood Critics Association Creative Arts TV Awards | Best Casting in a Drama Series | Bad Sisters | |||
| Irish Film & Television Awards | Television Drama | [26] | |||
| Director – Television Drama | Dearbhla Walsh | ||||
| Script – Television Drama | Sharon Horgan | ||||
| Actress – Television Drama | |||||
| Supporting Actor – Television Drama | Brian Gleeson | ||||
| Daryl McCormack | |||||
| Michael Smiley | |||||
| Supporting Actress – Television Drama | Eva Birthistle | ||||
| Anne-Marie Duff | |||||
| Eve Hewson | |||||
| Sarah Greene | |||||
| Production Design | Mark Geraghty | ||||
| Ivor Novello Awards | Best Television Soundtrack | PJ Harvey and Tim Phillips | [27] | ||
| 2024 | Artios Awards | Outstanding Achievement in Casting – Television Drama Pilot or First Season | Nina Gold | [28] [29] | |
| Primetime Emmy Awards | Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series | Sharon Horgan | [30] | ||
| Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series | |||||
| Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series | |||||
| Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Awards | Outstanding Casting for a Drama Series | Nina Gold and Lucy Amos |