Peacock’s new take on The ’Burbs arrives with a clear mission: keep the paranoia, update the perspective, and let a new kind of neighbor lead the chaos. The eight-episode dark comedy thriller reimagines the 1989 cult favorite made famous by Tom Hanks, trading in a bored suburban husband for a new mother trying to figure out whether the danger is real or if she’s simply losing sleep and her grip at the same time.
The bones are familiar. We’re back in Hinckley Hills, tucked inside a too-quiet cul-de-sac where everybody waves, everybody watches, and everybody knows more than they admit. When Samira, played by Keke Palmer, and her husband Rob (Jack Whitehall) move into his childhood home with their newborn, she quickly becomes the daytime ambassador of the family. Rob is at work. Samira is left with the stroller, the introductions, and the slow realization that something about the mansion across the street doesn’t sit right.
Then someone moves in. And like any good story about suburbia, curiosity spreads faster than facts.
Palmer is the anchor
Let’s start where the show is strongest: Keke Palmer.
She has the hardest job here, and she makes it look easy. Palmer moves fluidly between humor and unease, suspicion and vulnerability, and she does it in a way that keeps the audience tethered to Samira even when the plot threatens to wander. She builds chemistry with nearly everyone on the block — the overly friendly neighbors, the ones she doesn’t trust, the awkward encounters that make suburbia feel like performance art.
Even when scenes wobble, she doesn’t. That’s star power. That’s command.
The only relationship that doesn’t quite spark is the one that should ground her most. Samira and Rob’s marriage often feels more explained than felt. To the show’s credit, Rob’s frequent absence keeps that weakness from overwhelming the narrative, but it’s noticeable.
A character sketch that never fully colors in
Samira’s brother, played by RJ Cyler, brings warmth and familiarity whenever he appears, but the writing around him feels hesitant. The series gestures toward defining traits — hints at personality, hints at identity — yet stops short of making a firm choice. The result is a character who reads less like layered and more like unfinished.
Audiences can sense uncertainty. And in a landscape where specificity is often the key to authenticity, vagueness stands out.
When themes feel announced instead of lived
The series also steps into conversations about what it means to be Black in predominantly white spaces. At its best, it handles this with restraint. The quieter exchanges, especially between Samira and her brother or Samira and a young Black girl in the neighborhood, feel intimate and real. They capture awareness without spectacle.
But at other moments, the show reaches for bigger statements, and that’s where it can start to feel familiar in a way that isn’t always flattering. Instead of deepening our understanding of Samira, those beats sometimes feel like the show signaling that it has something important to say.
There’s a difference between observation and announcement, and the series doesn’t always know which one it wants to be.
The intelligence problem
Where the writing struggles most is in maintaining character consistency.
Samira is introduced as a civil litigation attorney — someone trained to measure risk, read situations, and think several steps ahead. Yet as the mystery accelerates, she often makes choices that seem designed more to serve momentum than personality. It’s not that she’s curious; curiosity makes sense. It’s that her professional instincts occasionally vanish when the episode needs her to leap.
When that happens, viewers stop watching a woman navigate danger and start watching a script manufacture it.
Missing the bite of the original
Joe Dante’s film thrived on escalating groupthink. Neighbors fed one another’s paranoia until suspicion became its own monster. The new series references that idea but rarely pushes it far enough to feel dangerous. The mob energy is present in theory, softer in practice.
What remains is entertaining, but it doesn’t sting the way it could.
And the mystery?
Here’s the thing: it’s fine.
Not jaw-dropping. Not infuriating. Just… fine.
The reveal narrows rather than explodes, and by the end, the personalities populating the street often prove more compelling than the secret itself.
So, should you watch?
If you enjoy the cozy-chaos blend of Only Murders in the Building or the suburban satire of Based on a True Story, you’ll likely find something to like here. It isn’t as sharp, but it’s accessible. It’s the kind of show you can settle into without bracing yourself.
Would I come back for another season? Probably.
Would I be heartbroken if I couldn’t? Not quite.
But seeing Palmer command a series again is a reminder of what she does exceptionally well: hold center, elevate the room, and make you keep watching even when the writing hasn’t fully caught up.
And sometimes, that’s reason enough.