A new mystery thriller series from Hulu has debuted with a solid Rotten Tomatoes score. Hulu is a streaming service now owned by Disney Entertainment that was founded in 2007 and started producing original content less than half a decade later, in 2011. One of the most prominent Hulu original series is the dystopian sci-fi drama The Handmaid's Tale, which is based on the novel of the same name by Margaret Atwood and has so far won 15 Primetime Emmy Awards in addition to earning an average score of 83% on Rotten Tomatoes across its five seasons and counting.

The roster of Hulu shows also includes an increasing number of well-reviewed mysteries and thrillers. One of the most recent of these, from their partnership with FX, is Brit Marling's A Murder at the End of the World, about an amateur detective solving an Arctic murder, which stars Marling, Emma Corrin, Harris Dickinson, Alice Braga, Joan Chen, Raúl Esparza, and Jermaine Fowler, and earned 89% on Rotten Tomatoes. Other well reviewed Hulu offerings that embody either genre include the whodunit comedy Only Murders in the Building (96%), and the psychological thriller The Patient (89%), starring Steve Carell and Domhnall Gleeson.

Paradise Has Earned Good Reviews

The Hulu Show Was Created By Dan Fogelman

Hulu's Paradise has debuted with a solid score on Rotten Tomatoes. The show, which was created by TV hitmaker Dan Fogelman (who created NBC's This Is Us and executive produces Hulu's Only Murders in the Building), stars Emmy winner and Oscar nominee Sterling K. Brown as Secret Service agent Xavier Collins, whose latest assignment is to protect former President Cal Bradford (James Marsden). The show, which features Brown as an executive producer alongside Fogelman and others, also stars Julianne Nicholson, Sarah Shahi, Nicole Brydon Bloom, Aliyah Mastin, and Percy Daggs IV.

Sterling K. Brown was nominated for an Oscar for his performance in American Fiction in 2024 and won an Emmy for his narration of Lincoln: Divided We Stand in 2021.

Rotten Tomatoes has now calculated an official score for Paradise several days ahead of its premiere. Thanks to 7 different critics' reviews, the show has earned a solidly Fresh 86% score with an average rating of 7.1 out of 10. While this score could fluctuate as more reviews are added, at the time of writing, it is the latest in a string of well-reviewed television shows for Dan Fogelman, who has not earned a Rotten Tomatoes splat from television reviewers in more than a decade since his 2012 sitcom The Neighbors (31%), which starred Jami Gertz and Lenny Venito.

What This Means For Paradise

The Show Could Have A Solid Future

Even though Hulu has had a recent string of successful mysteries and thrillers, Paradise stands out among them for a variety of reasons. The positive reviews for its freshman season have generally praised its cast, its characters, and the writing, encouraging viewers to avoid spoilers and see it for themselves. While some find its exuberantly overstuffed approach to story and genre to be overwhelming, the majority agree that it is a unique project within Fogelman's oeuvre that is well worth watching.

Dan Fogelman [could potentially] be behind two ongoing Hulu mystery series at once...

If these Paradise reviews translate to glowing audience reviews and strong overall viewership numbers, the show could become a solid success and quickly earn a season 2 renewal. Should that be the case, it would mean that Dan Fogelman will be behind two ongoing Hulu mystery series at once, as Only Murders in the Building recently concluded season 4 and has already been renewed for the season 5.

Our Take On The Paradise Rotten Tomatoes Score

Rotten Tomatoes Could Take The Show A Long Way

Although there are still a few days until the official premiere of Paradise on Hulu, it seems entirely possible that the show could become a hit with audiences in addition to critics. Although precedent shows that the audience score could dip below the critic score slightly, so far, only one Dan Fogelman series has ever earned a Rotten score from s on Rotten Tomatoes. Meanwhile, every Fresh score has been solidly so, with a rating higher than 80%. Below, see a breakdown of the scores of previous Fogelman shows and how they compare to the critic scores:

Additionally, though the six This Is Us seasons had an average score of 81%, season 1 reached a peak of 91%, making that outing second only to the short-lived musical comedy Galavant on Rotten Tomatoes. Given this strong precedent set by the prolific television creator, writer, and executive producer, Paradise could quite easily earn an audience score of more than 80%. That score, combined with its solidly Fresh critic score, could go a long way in helping the Hulu show reach a wider audience.

Paradise premieres with its first three episodes on Hulu on January 28, followed by weekly episodes on Tuesdays.

Source: Rotten Tomatoes