Now on Netflix: A French Thriller Just Shot to #2 Globally—And It’s Only Six Episodes Long! 🌍😱

A single mom. A flower farm. A shocking murder tied to her past—and an inheritance no one saw coming.
Under a Dark Sun is the 6-episode mystery dominating 60+ countries.
Don’t miss the summer’s most quietly addictive drama.

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Netflix’s new crime drama Under a Dark Sun is quietly taking over the streaming charts. Under a Dark Sun premiered on Netflix on Jul. 9 and largely slipped under the radar of many North American critics and viewers. The series stars Ava Baya as Alba Mazier, or Alba Lassere, a single mother who takes a job at the sprawling Lassere flower farm prior to starting a new life in Barcelona with her young son. Shortly after taking the job, Lassere family patriarch Arnauld is murdered, a crime which Alba is implicated in not just because of her general presence on the farm at the time, but becuase of the revelation that she is Arnauld’s illegitimate daughter to whom he left a massive inheritance upon the most recent changing of his last will and testament.

The leading ensemble cast of Under a Dark Sun is rounded out by Isabelle Adjani, Guillaume Gouix, Nicolas Vaude, Amina Ben Ismail, Claire Romain, Redouanne Harjane Juliette Plumecocq-Mech, Simon Ehrlacher, Louise Coldefy, and Thibault de Montalembert. The series’ first four episodes were directed by Marie Jardillier, while its exceptionally tense final two episodes were directed by Edouard Salier. Under a Dark Sun‘s writing team consisted of HPI (the inspiration for High Potential) writer Thomas Colineau, Camille Couasse, Marine Lachenaud, Claire le Luhern, Jules Lugan, and Nils-Antoine Sambuc.

Is It Really Worth It to Watch Under a Dark Sun?

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Although Under a Dark Sun doesn’t yet have enough critical reviews to register a numerical score on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes’ “Tomatometer,” it does hold positive reviews overall. The series has been praised for its layered narrative and complex storyline, as well as the ways in which the interpersonal relationships between individual characters come together. Critics have pointed towards the series’ overarching mystery as a fairly simple, even pedestrian effort, whereas some of the series’ internal logic has been described as a “whirlwind.” This could easily be a feature rather than a bug, however, as the series’ original French title, Qui Sème le Vent, is taken from a popular phrase, “qui sème le vent récolte la tempête,” which roughly translates in English to, “he who sows the wind reaps the whirlwind.”

Under a Dark Sun Continues a Recent Netflix Trend

A woman stands bathed in sunlight in Under a Dark SunImage via Netflix

Under a Dark Sun is merely the latest example of Netflix’s latest interesting trend of international films and series finding tremendous success, even with American audiences. As a worldwide streaming platform, Netflix offers a wide range of stories for its subscribers, including those from filmmakers all over the globe. While its best-known original projects are typically English-language stories from American creators, recent years have seen a stunning reversal of this trend. The South Korean thriller series Squid Game, while not the very first example of this trend, broke the mold most publicly in 2021, dominating Netflix’s charts to become one of the most popular shows of the year (on Netflix or otherwise). In the four years since, Netflix has seen numerous other foreign-language films and television series achieve widespread success. One of the most recent examples of this is the German-language action-thriller Exterritorial, which debuted on the platform earlier this year.

Under a Dark Sun continues this trend as the French-language series continues to climb Netflix’s streaming charts. The show’s massive success naturally encourages questions of a potential continuation. While Under a Dark Sun was originally conceived as a six-part miniseries, no one has ruled out a second season. Given the show’s popularity, Netflix may find itself determined to find new stories to tell after Season 1’s dynamic murder mystery. A second season could see Béatrice entangled in another twisty mystery or take a page out of The White Lotus‘s book and tell another story with an all-new cast of characters. There is certainly potential for a second season of Under a Dark Sun, though fans will have to wait to see if the French miniseries ever returns for more episodes.

Under a Dark Sun is currently available for streaming on Netflix.