Overview

• Apple TV+ released the first two episodes of Smoke on June 27 and will drop the remaining seven weekly through August 15.
• Critics have commended Taron Egerton and Jurnee Smollett’s performances while noting uneven pacing and thin narrative depth.
• In a July 2 interview, creator Dennis Lehane disclosed that surviving a building fire two decades ago shaped the series’ thematic focus on trauma.
• The nine-episode drama adapts the Firebug podcast, which chronicles serial arsonist John Leonard Orr’s multi-decade spree.
• The plot follows a haunted arson investigator and a police detective pursuing multiple fire-setters across the Pacific Northwest.