Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft’ on Netflix, In Which a Woman Reckons With Grief And Guilt While on a Hunt to Recover a Stolen Artifact

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Based on Crystal Dynamics’ popular Tomb Raider video game series , Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft is a Netflix Original animated action-adventure series that fills in the gaps between the events of the reboot trilogy and the original series of games. British actress Hayley Atwell leads the way as the titular character over the course of an eight-episode first season that looks to hook viewers with its blend of the fresh and familiar. Is the series a success or a mess? Read on to find out.

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Opening Shot: We see a peaceful-looking jungle accompanied by only the sound of birdsong until a young woman bursts through the brush to disturb the peace. She’s running away from three men armed with knives. Cornered, she makes a long, daring leap from one side of a ravine to another, successfully evading her pursuers and making it to the base of a carved mountain face. She consults a map and begins to climb.

The Gist: The aforementioned young woman outrunning pursuers is Lara Croft (Hayley Atwell), a young British woman with a passion for adventure and treasure hunting. She’s in Chile, where she has managed to finish a journey her late father, Richard, once started by successfully finding the House of the Jaguar. She ambles and scraps her way into the House, where she meets up with longtime family friend and mentor Conrad Roth (Nolan North) to retrieve a legendary box holding an ancient artifact. Although the ominous carvings on the tomb’s walls give Lara pause, Roth insists they take the box. On the way out, they are surrounded once more by pursuers, only to take them all out. Roth reminds Lara that survival is the most important thing above all else.

Three years later, Lara is in Peru’s Chumbivilcas Province, fighting in the street with a masked woman while people watch and jeer around them. After winning the fight, she gets a call from her friend Jonah Maiava (Earl Baylon), who asks her to come back home and stop running from her problems. Lara is tortured by guilt at the loss of Roth, who died protecting her on an expedition. Inspired by a Pachamama ceremony she witnesses, Lara decides to unburden herself of her father’s and Roth’s ghosts by getting rid of their old artifacts and possessions.

Back at her father’s vaguely haunted-looking mansion in the UK, her friends Jonah and Zip (Allen Maldonado) help Lara clear out old objects to auction them off in partnership with the British Museum. But a mysterious man’s presence opens the door to trouble when he breaks into Lara’s family home to steal the old Chilean box. Even after an intense fight and car chase, the man, Charles Devereaux (Richard Armitage), gets away on a boat with eventual designs on China for the sister box of this ancient artifact. Despite her friends’ worries, Lara is determined to track Charles down and retrieve the box because it’s the last artifact she found with Roth before he died. In the wrong hands, the box’s impact could be catastrophic, and it’s up to Lara (and her friends) to fight her demons and save the day.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft may remind you of National Treasure: Edge of History , the 2022-2023 action-adventure series about a young woman’s expedition to recover a lost, ancient treasure with mysterious ties to her past, as her friends help her along the way. And, of course, there are the two Angelina Jolie movie entries ( Lara Croft: Tomb Raider , Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life ) and the less well-received Alicia Vikander reboot ( Tomb Raider ) if you’re itching for more adventures of the buxom Brit.

Our Take: A clever mix of self-aware humor and intense, heart-pounding action, Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft takes the familiar British archeologist Lara Croft and gives her a whole new story to tell. Bolstered by smooth animation and rich visuals, the show’s world feels lived-in and sure of itself, just waiting to be explored by our titular heroine and her friends.

The characters themselves are sympathetic and complicated, with Lara herself especially human in her deep grief and guilt that she’s desperate to escape at all costs. To Lara, this new retrieval mission is yet another vice to escape having to deal with her heavy feelings and past events, but for us viewers, it’s the chance to better understand the character and see her grow.

Tomb Raider kicks its series off with a bang in a pilot that shows more than tells, dropping breadcrumbs of information and exposition while largely keeping us hungry for more. The key pieces are on the board, including the mysterious thief in Charles whom we have yet to know much of anything about, and now comes the fun of seeing how it all plays out. Who exactly is Charles? What all went down to make some of Lara’s friends turn their backs on her? What exactly is the story of this ancient box and the immense power that lies within it? We’re eager to keep watching to find the answers to these questions and more.

Sex and Skin: There’s some animated violence but no sex or skin.

Parting Shot: Charles uses the stolen artifact to brainwash the boat’s crew member, instructing him to kill his captain. But just before the crew member can pull the trigger on the harpoon, Charles instructs him to stop. An out-of-season storm suddenly breaks, confusing the captain. “That is no storm,” Charles replies. “That is the dawn of a new era. Chaos is coming.” His eyes glow green, screen fades to black. Ominous!

Sleeper Star: Allen Maldonado truly pops as Zip, with a vocal performance oozing with personality, drawing the viewer in and making him instantly likable. From the moment he first speaks, he endears himself to the viewer and draws focus. He also provides some nice comic relief to balance out the heavier dramatic moments.

Most Pilot-y Line: “I’m not asking you to be the person you were before all that. I know that’s not possible. Loss changes us permanently. But you can’t rebuild yourself by running away. You build by coming home and letting your friends help you.” On the nose, but well said, Jonah.

Our Call: STREAM IT! Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft has action, mystery, and a sincere emotional core that combine to form a fleshed-out world and story that will pique your interest. With plenty of compelling plotlines, questions, and characters set up in the first episode, we look forward to continuing on with them to see where this exciting adventure will lead.

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