The Sympathizer Review: A potent spy series with star-making turn from Hoa Xuande

The protagonist of Park Chan-wook's latest HBO series, The Sympathizer, is self-admittedly 'a synthesis of incompatibilities.' And in the pilot episode of the show, it is exactly this point that is brought up time and again, almost in every other frame, in myriad ways. The lead character of Hoa Xuande is only addressed as Captain in the A24-backed show. And it is though his eyes that we see a war unfold and roll back.

The first episode of The Sympathizer does the job of setting up the story well. The complex socio-political and geographical history of Vietnam and its people, and the US' involvement in it, is laid out in front of us.

Centred around the Vietnam war, we see this layered story via our unreliable narrator, played brilliantly by Xuande. He is not the most reliable voice, but he is our proxy voice, almost playing a neutral agent in this game of war and death. However, initially, we see Captain working for the General and the South Vietnam, with the American support, which has been charismatically portrayed by Hollywood superstar Robert Downey Jr. Captain is actually a communist, he is a mole for the North Vietnam and its fighters. His intention is to 'free' his country.

Xuande delivers a star-making performance. His switch from a loyal-to-the-cause Vietnamese to an Americanised Vietnamese is fluid. He portrays the inconsistencies and incompatibilities of his bi-racial character flawlessly. His act is aided by a strong script which doesn't dumb things down for the audience and constantly goes back and forth in the story.

Memory, as is established early on, plays a pivotal role in The Sympathizer. Like the novel it is based on by Viet Thanh Nguyen, director and showrunner Park emphasizes the importance of memory in war and how our present is constantly being redefined by what we choose to remember and forget.

Captain's upbringing and parents -- who we know precious little about apart from the fact that they were a French coloniser and a Vietnamese native -- clearly had a deep impact on how he eventually turned out to be, a mix of cultures and values. After all, despite looking like a Vietnamese, Captain dreams in English, which is not his mother tongue. It is easy to then surmise that Captain's soul is torn; he is constantly searching within himself and in the outside world for something which will feel familiar, like home. This is also one of reasons why he has been described derogatorily as 'two-faced.' A crude reminder of his dual ethnicities and his actual longing for both Vietnam and America.

A strong light is also shone upon how Vietnamese history is often told from the coloniser's perspective, but for once, Captain is attempting to show us his truth, thereby bringing a sense of urgency and honesty to his duplicity. This, in turn, makes The Sympathizer a bold and audacious attempt to bring voice to the voiceless and ignored, and so far, it has carried out that assignment wonderfully.

This review is based on the one episode of the show which recently premiered on JioCinema.