REVIEW: ‘Run Away’ Is Signature Harlan Coben, For The Best

Harlan Coben mysteries have taken over just about every streaming platform. A limited series developed by showrunner Danny Brocklehurst, Run Away is adapted from Coben’s novel of the same name. The Netflix Original stars James Nesbitt, Ellie de Lange, Ruth Jones, Minnie Driver, Alfred Enoch, Lucian Msamati, and Jon Pointing.

In Run Away, we focus on a father named Simon Greene (James Nesbitt). Up until recently, Simon had the perfect life: a loving wife and kids, a great job, and a beautiful home. But then his eldest daughter, Paige (Ellie de Lange), ran away.

Her absence left a void in the family’s life with questions about where she is, how she got that way, and a hatred for the boyfriend that they all believe pushed her down the road to addiction. And now, the Greene family is trying to pick up the pieces and bring their daughter home. 

Netflix’s Run Away starts small and ends up as a country-wide mystery with depth.

When Simon finds her, vulnerable and strung out on drugs in a city park, he finally has the chance to bring his little girl home. But it turns out she’s not alone, and an argument escalates into shocking violence caught on video, and ultimately, it doesn’t seem like Paige wants to come home.

That confrontation begins to spiral, with the aftermath opening a festering grief for Simon, and pulling him into the dangerous underworld that he had no idea existed. But it’s not just Simon’s family on the block, as he continues to chase after his “little girl,” Simon reveals deep secrets that could tear his family apart forever, and leaves others murdered.

The series ultimately takes on four perspectives. The first is through our protagonist, Simon. He’s a father whose daughter relies on drugs to push her trauma away. When she ends up with a bad guy, her father can’t help but believe he is to blame for her life falling to pieces.

An ensemble cast and stellar pacing make Run Away a great limited series, and a greater mystery.

However, this is a Harlan Coben story, and that is too simple.  When Simon beats up Paige’s boyfriend in broad daylight in Episode 1, he finds himself at the center of a much larger crime and conspiracy than he could have thought. Anger begets intrigue, and all of a sudden, a bad boyfriend turns into a traumatic past and violent future that Simon pulls his family into. Or, at least he believes he does.

That’s where the second perspective comes in, the police. A police duo (and perfect romantic couple), Isaac Fagbenle and Ruby Todd, played by Alfred Enoch and Amy Gledhill respectively, begin to untwist the story in front of them.

Chasing down leads and overturning stones where truths have been hidden, often confronting Simon with an uncomfortable truth about his “baby girl” that he isn’t always ready to deal with. But the cops are too slow, and too concerned with their own case, that they lose sight of the forest for the trees as more crimes begin to surface, and more murders are committed.

The third is through Simon’s private investigator, Elena Ravenscroft (Ruth Jones). Having discovered a secret child that her deceased husband had, Elena is working through her own hurt, but joins Simon in trying to solve his. A much smaller perspective but vital nonetheless, Elena is a pillar in most of the episodes, until things begin to crash down around everyone in Run Away’s final few episodes. 

Four perspectives come together to tell Harlan Coben’s story.

Finally, Run Away gives audiences sight into two contract killers, Dee Dee (Maeve Courtier-Lilley) and Ash (Jon Pointing), their reasons for it, and the cult that they have found themselves beholden to. Murderers looking for some kind of justice for their past, the duo rubs against every expectation and complicates the entire series, even when it begins to work itself out. 

Dee Dee and Ash are two of the most compelling characters in the ensemble and are the only ones who rival Simon in their pitiful lot in life. Taking matters into their own hands, Harlan Coben’s Run Away allows the audience to see who they are and add weight to their tragedy, no matter how out of place they may seem on paper. 

It’s with Dee Dee and Ash that we see some of Run Away’s more out-of-this-world storytelling. A duo of formerly abused kids, they wander into Simon’s story just as easily as they are ultimately inconsequential to it. However, their chemistry, questioning, and trauma are some of the most interesting in the series, so much so that I found myself more invested in their lives than wanting Simon to bring Priage home. 

Dee Dee and Ash are Runaway’s most compelling characters in this Netflix Original limited series.

But with mystery being the cornerstone of Run Away, that’s as much as I will say about the plot. Leaving you with enough to see how wide and messy the series is, but how that mess becomes a feature instead of a bug. Miscommunication, lies, and unfounded assumptions drive the series far and keep it entertaining from start to finish.

With some stellar performances, this short, simple series embraces the prestige television format, ending each episode with the right kind of cliffhanger that makes you press play immediately. The lives that we step into with Run Away are messy, but Simon’s relentless pursuit grounds it all. He carries the weight for his choices, and the hint of hopelessness we see in the miniseries’ finale brings it all into pitiful focus, in a good way.

Despite the twists, turns, and surprise murders that mount, Simon is still just a dad. He’s a father, looking for his daughter, and hoping that she is okay, even if he kicks so much dirt doing so that the world he leaves for others is in shambles. 

Melodrama, mystery, and compelling characetrs hold Halan Coben’s Run Away together.

Where the performances carry much of the narrative weight and earn praise at each revelation, the limited series’ pacing is what really keeps you engaged as an audience. With so many perspectives and what could easily be seen as near-muddied reveals and twists, the timing of it all keeps everything in perfect balance.

There is the right amount of whodunnit, of melodrama, of action, and of doubt that all come together to form a good mystery made better by how it is spread between each of the episodes. But more importantly, there are so many characters in the ensemble to latch onto that if one element of the mystery doesn’t pull you in entirely, another will. 

Run Away is a Harlan Coben story through and through, and it has the best elements that audiences have come to expect. The reality is that the reasons behind every choice mean much less than the outcome. The secrets that mount and cause guilt and grief don’t stop mounting, but ultimately they don’t matter as much as the secrets that the characetrs choose to keep in the end. 

Harlan Coben’s Run Away is streaming now, exclusively on Netflix.