All’s Fair’s Bad Reviews Are Making It a Must Watch
Despite having some huge stars attached like Kim Kardashian, Sarah Paulson, Naomi Watts, Glenn Close, and Niecy Nash-Betts, All’s Fair, a new legal drama from Ryan Murphy, is not holding up in the court of the critics. The series follows a group of divorce attorneys, all women, who defend their female clients against the bad men they’re divorcing, while several of the lawyers are going through their own messy cases in their personal lives. Overwhelmingly, most reviewers’ ratings of the show range from zero stars to being called “empty, unforgivably dull.” Unfortunately, we are drawn to anything called “unforgivably dull” like a magnet. What’s going on in this show that’s making everyone so fiery? While it doesn’t seem like it will become the next Law & Order, All’s Fair does have one thing going for them: we’re all dying to watch these #GirlBoss lawyers every week, even if critics don’t think it’s great.
“If this was all part of a lurid, camp drama played with gusto by all and narratively stuffed with treats, Murphy might have got away with it. But no one seems to know what they’re doing; the performances seem to respond to about nine different ideas of what the show is and the plots are dismal. The trio (’You’re the best divorce lawyers in town – maybe the country’) wrap up multiple cases in the time it takes Kim K’s nail varnish to dry. There’s the younger wife who falls in love with the woman her husband hires for a threesome, then walks off 10 minutes later with a $210m settlement once Nash acquires video evidence of his extensive perversions. (’Sow teats’ is all I’m prepared to say here. Do not let this tempt you into watching.)” — Lucy Mangan, The Guardian
“The drama generally falls flat, too, at delivering the sort of watercooler — or to put it in more 2025 terms, TikTok-friendly — moments it seems reverse-engineered to create. It’s not for a lack of wild overreactions. But even when Carr smashes a model boat to smithereens after a professional rejection or Allura imagines herself going full Lemonade on Chase’s sidepiece, their actions feel divorced from any larger context. These characters are so thin, their storylines so flimsy and their motives so underbaked that there’s no recognizable emotion underlying any of it, and thus no feeling to be provoked by watching it.” — Angie Han, The Hollywood Reporter
“Well done, Kim. You must have quite a healthy ego yourself to star in what may well be the worst television drama ever made. Because All’s Fair (Disney+) is so bad, it’s not even enjoyably so. It thinks it’s a feminist fable about spirited lawyers getting their own back on cruel rich men but is in fact a tacky and revolting monument to the same greed, vanity and avarice it supposedly targets. All scripted, it feels, by a toddler who couldn’t write “bum” on a wall.” — Ben Dowell, The Times
“A procedural about divorce lawyers is a good idea, but “All’s Fair” feels like the first draft of it. The waste feels more flagrant with every pornographic shot of a Chanel bag, vintage car or over-the-top ensemble. “All’s Fair” wants to deliver wish fulfillment — a nonstop montage of middle-aged women enjoying their wealth, success and all the power that comes with them. But the show skips straight to dessert without building any connective tissue in the form of character depth or believable tension. Like all sugar rushes, the high fades fast and you’re left with a stomachache.” — Alison Herman, Variety
“In other words, we’re shown close-ups of souped-up sports cars growling on the driveways of multimillion-dollar LA mega-mansions that are vast glass pantheons of wealth and sterile living. Filler shots of chauffeurs, champagne and colossal walk-in closets with pristine designer clobber glistening and gleaming from glass shelves centred around trays and trays of priceless jewels assault the viewer’s senses between almost every scene. Indeed, millions of dollars worth of jewellery becomes the centre of not one but two of the plotlines in the first episode. From a gift of Elizabeth Taylor’s ring, bestowed on Allura, by her cheating younger husband, to $40 million worth of trinkets that Liberty helps salvage from her Upper East Side client wanting a divorce. It all feels icky; like an orgy of vulgarity where greed rules, love means nothing and we’re somehow being forced to feel we should all want to revel in this world too.” — Emily Maddick, Glamour UK
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