Ankh-Morpork’s police force is a joke until Captain Richard Dormer’s booze-soaked Vimes, Lady Lara Rossi’s dragon-breeding aristocrat and rookie constable Adam Hugill’s mountain-raised Carrot collide with a resurrected criminal (Samuel Adewunmi) and a weapon that could end the city. Across eight 40-minute episodes the squad swells to include werewolf Marama Corlett, dwarf forensics officer Joni Ayton-Kent and talking stone troll Ralph Ineson, all while supreme ruler Anna Chancellor plays politics and Wendell Pierce’s gravelly Death keeps score.
Showrunner Simon Allen discards Pratchett’s cosy satire for neon graffiti, leather and synth-rock, relocating the action to a steampunk metropolis where crime guilds operate like franchises and the Watch operate like a failing start-up. The tone swings from cop-show banter to apocalyptic fantasy, the budget stretches only far enough for one dragon and the plot races so fast that character arcs finish in montage, yet the cast sell every beat with straight faces and heavier hearts.
Shot in Cape Town and premiered on BBC America from 3 January to 14 February 2021, the series landed to baffled Discworld loyalists and polite shrugs from newcomers; eight weeks later it was quietly cancelled, leaving Narrativia’s long-gestating dream of a sprawling Watch-verse dead in the water and Pratchett’s estate already fielding questions about the next adaptation.
Production Details
BBC America / 1 Season / 8 Episodes / 2021 - Present
Created by: Simon Allen
Showrunner(s): Ben Donald, Richard Stokes, Craig Viveiros
Writer(s): Simon Allen, Catherine Tregenna, Joy Wilkinson
Producer(s): Johann Knobel
Main Cast
Richard Dormer as Captain Sam Vimes
Lara Rossi as Lady Sybil Ramkin
Marama Corlett as Corporal Angua von Uberwald
Adam Hugill as Constable Carrot Ironfoundersson
Joni Ayton-Kent as Constable Cheery
Samuel Adewunmi as Carcer Dun
Bianca Simone Mannie as Wonse
Craig Macrae as Death
Anna Chancellor as Lord Vetinari
Wendell Pierce as Death (voice)
Matt Berry as Wayne
Ingrid Oliver as Dr Cruces
