Stream It Or Skip It: ‘My Brilliant Friend’ Season 4 On Max, Where A Story Of Lifelong Friendship And Rivalry Makes Its Grand Finale

Based on the last book in Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels series entitled The Story of the Lost Child, My Brilliant Friend: Season 4 is the show’s final installment. The HBO Original Italian coming-of-age drama follows Elena “Lenù” Greco (Alba Rohrwacher) as she recounts her history with the most significant friend of her life, Raffaella “Lila” Cerullo (Irene Maiorino), from meeting as kids in 1950s Naples to the 60 years across space and time. How will the show conclude this oh-so-human story of love, loss, and lifelong friendship? And is it worth tuning in to find out?

MY BRILLIANT FRIEND SEASON 4: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: Lenù is older and donning a slinky slip dress in a French hotel lobby full of fancy professionals. She steps away to call her jilted husband Pietro Airota (Pier Giorgio Bellocchio), inquiring about their daughters. She says she has some more promotional events to do abroad, but she’ll be back for Christmas Eve. He tells her not to bother coming back, before hanging up, leaving her standing forlornly listening to the dial tone.

The Gist: At the end of My Brilliant Friend: Season 3, Lenù left her husband, Pietro, and daughters Dede (Vittoria Cozza) and Elsa (Fatima Credendino), behind in Italy to run off to Montpellier, France with her current lover and the object of her affection since childhood, Nino Sarratore (Fabrizio Gifuni). After spending multiple months in France, she extended her stay to meet with two publishers interested in her book. Meanwhile, Nino continues to be in contact with his wife, Eleonora, but remaining evasive with Lenù about it.

On Christmas Eve, Lenù returns to an empty home and a month’s worth of unanswered voicemails from her longtime best friend, Lila. She then calls Pietro’s sister, Maria Rosa (Sonia Bergamasco) to find out that her daughters are with Pietro’s parents in Turin, giving Lenù the chance to hash things out with Pietro face-to-face. When they attempt to hash out the details of the separation, Pietro becomes enraged and threatning when Lenù suggests that she might get a home for her and their daughters in Naples.

Lenù’s mother, Immacolata (Anna Rita Vitolo), begs Pietro and Lenù to make up instead of getting a divorce, then reacting with both verbal and physical abuse towards her daughter after she says she’s in love with someone else. Lenù then shoves her mother to the ground in retaliation, and then Immacolata renounces Lenù as her daughter.

Not long after, Lenù plans to pick up Dede and Elsa in Turin but bails on them for a two-day seaside sojourn to Monte Argentario with Nino. Two days turns into years spent traveling with Nino and visiting her daughters intermittently in between stints of travel. By 1978, Lenù and Nino are brought closer together as the country is in turmoil, living in their own little bubble with little regard for the opinions and feelings of others.

That bubble is suddenly burst when Pietro ends up in the hospital after a random attack by two fascists on the street. In rushing to his bedside, Lenù not only comes face-to-face with Pietro, but also with the new woman in his life, and Lenù’s two daughters. Everyone seems to have been content without her, and the reunion with her girls is noticibly awkward. Lenù tells Pietro that she wants to move to Naples with Nino and her daughters as soon as possible, and Pietro calmly accepts, but his mother is not as accepting.

Through it all, Lila has been calling Lenù, her calls unanswered and unreturned. But after two years of running, Lenù is ready to face her past and put down roots in Naples. Nino is on board, but their celebratory mood is interrupted by the revelation that Nino not only spoke to Lila on the phone recently but also met with her in person. For some reason, Nino is only just now volunteering this information, but says that Lila could only talk and ask about Lenù. Even so, cracks seem to form in their happy relationship, exacerbated by the mysterious phone calls Nino keeps receiving.

In Naples, Lenù meets up with Carmela “Carmen” Peluso (Francesca Pezzella) at a cafe for a brief catch up, when Lila unexpectedly drops by. Lenù never told Lila she was coming back because she didn’t want to get her roped into any more drama (or so she claims), but it turns out Lila was readily involving herself from the start. In hopes of protecting Lenù, she had someone follow Nino, only to reveal that he never actually left his wife even though he told Lenù he had. And to add insult to injury, he was still living with her through his entire affair with Lenù. Things are already a mess for Lenù, and yet her time back in Naples with Lila is only just getting started.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? My Brilliant Friend: Season 4 just may remind you of Conversations With Friends, or at least certain aspects of it. Both shows are based on novels, and both feature female protagonist that’s an aspiring writer whose unhealthy relationship with an older married man gets in the way of her close female friendship.

Our Take: Throughout its run, My Brilliant Friend has remained somewhat underrated while still maintaining a passionate fanbase and critical acclaim. The show is poised to continue its positive legacy, and perhaps even gain some more notoriety along the way, with its fourth and final season if this first episode is any indication.

Similar to shows like House of the Dragon and The Crown, My Brilliant Friend switches out its actors over the course of various seasons to properly depict the aging and growth of the characters. While it can be sad to see familiar faces go, the new ones in My Brilliant Friend: Season 4 are more than ready to fill the shoes of their respective characters, bursting onto the scene in a way that makes them instantly engrossing and believable.

Every character is bursting with life and personality that colors their words and actions, making you hang on every word, every physical subtleties. At times the acting is so believable, that watching feels voyeuristic, and you just want to reach through the screen to shake Lenù out of the infatuation with Nino that has come to consume her entire life. Seriously, that guy is the worst. But the show does a lovely job of showing vs. telling everything from Lenù’s complicated relationships with her family to Nino’s smooth-talking, unreliable true character, culminating in remarkable moments of realization and gut-punches for both the characters and viewers.

In our current age of distraction and multi-tasking, it can feel easy to overlook a show that demands your full attention like My Brilliant Friend does, both because you need to be fully plugged in to catch all the English subtitles, and also due to its measured pacing. But if you bear down and commit to the ride, I have no doubt that any and all seasons of this series are well worth your focus and time.

Sex and Skin: There is a moment of near-full nudity featuring butts and some boob, as well as multiple instance of implied sex. So while it’s nothing gratuitous, there’s definitely some adult content.

Parting Shot: Lenù walks down the street after getting some news that both breaks her heart and her trust in Nino all over again, a single tear falling as she keeps moving forward.

Sleeper Star: Alba Rohrwacher is consistently fantastic as Lenù, but Irene Maiorino proved especially captivating as Lila, even though she didn’t appear until the very end of the episode. Even so, she commanded the attention and respect befitting the new major role Lila seems to have taken in her and Lenù’s Naples community.

Most Pilot-y Line: “I am Elena Greco and my daughters are mine.” A bold statement from a woman who has barely seen her daughters in the past two years, but she’s figuring it out, I suppose.

Our Call: STREAM IT! My Brilliant Friend: Season 4 kicks off with a compelling and dramatic premiere that will immediately have viewers hooked and hungry for more. From the incredible acting to the impactful writing, this Italian series continues to expertly depict the complexity of human relationships over time and seems poised to end on a high with this fourth and final season.