Honestly, it’s a bit of a tragedy. While everyone was busy arguing over the ending of Succession or the dragon CGI in House of the Dragon, one of the most brutal, beautiful, and psychologically complex shows on television was quietly airing its final seasons. I’m talking about the HBO series My Brilliant Friend.
It’s based on Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels. If you’ve read them, you know the vibe. If you haven’t, imagine a story that spans sixty years of friendship, betrayal, and the desperate itch to escape the place that raised you. It’s set in a dusty, violent neighborhood on the outskirts of Naples. Post-war Italy isn't the postcard version you see on Instagram. It’s grey. It’s loud. It’s a place where a missed look or a debt can get you a glass bottle to the face.
The show follows Elena (Lenù) and Raffaella (Lila). They start as kids in the 1950s. They’re smart—too smart for their own good in a neighborhood that values girls only for their ability to clean a house or marry a shopkeeper.
The Brutal Reality of Growing Up in Naples
Most period dramas feel like they’re wearing costumes. You can see the makeup. You can hear the actors trying to sound "historical." But the HBO series My Brilliant Friend feels like a documentary filmed via a time machine. Saverio Costanzo, the show's creator, went to extreme lengths to get this right. They built a massive set in Caserta that perfectly recreates the rione (neighborhood). It looks lived-in. It looks suffocating.
Lila is the fire. She’s the one who stands up to the neighborhood bully, Marcello Solara. She’s the one who teaches herself Latin and Greek while working in her father’s shoe shop. Lenù is the mirror. She watches Lila, mimics her, competes with her, and eventually uses her as a ladder to climb out of the poverty they were born into.
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It’s a toxic friendship. It’s a beautiful friendship. It’s both.
People often ask me if they should watch it in Italian or the dubbed version. Watch it in Italian. Actually, most of it is in a specific Neapolitan dialect. It’s so thick that even people in Rome need subtitles to understand it. That’s how deep the realism goes. When the characters move from the neighborhood to the center of Naples, the language changes. It becomes "proper" Italian. That shift represents class. It represents power. You lose all of that nuance if you listen to the English dub.
Why the Casting Shift in Season 4 Matters
The show made a bold move. For the first three seasons, we grew up with Margherita Mazzucco and Gaia Girace. We watched them age from awkward teens to young mothers. But for the final season, based on The Story of the Lost Child, the production swapped them out for older actors.
Alba Rohrwacher takes over as Lenù. Fun fact: she’s been the narrator’s voice since the very first episode. Seeing her face finally match the voice we’ve heard for years is a trip. Irene Maiorino steps in as the adult Lila.
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Recasting is always a gamble. Usually, it fails. Here? It’s haunting. You can see the decades of resentment and shared history in their eyes. The show handles the passage of time better than almost any other series because it understands that we don't just "get older"—we become different people entirely while carrying the ghosts of our younger selves.
Not Just a "Girl Show"
There is a weird misconception that this is just a "female-centric" drama. Sure, it deals with the female experience in a patriarchal society, but that's a narrow way to look at it. It’s a political thriller. It’s a study of how communism and fascism tore through Italy. It’s about the Camorra (the Neapolitan mafia) and how they didn't just kill people—they owned the bread you bought and the shoes you wore.
The Solara brothers are some of the most chilling villains on TV. They don't wear capes. They wear expensive suits and sit in a bar. They represent the quiet, rot-like corruption that makes staying "good" almost impossible. Watching Lenù try to navigate her academic career in Florence while her roots in the neighborhood keep pulling her back into the Solaras' orbit is stressful. It's genuinely high-stakes television.
Maximize Your Viewing Experience
If you're going to dive into the HBO series My Brilliant Friend, don't binge it like a sitcom. It’s too heavy. It’s too dense.
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- Get a map of Naples. Seriously. Seeing where the neighborhood is in relation to the sea and the city center helps you understand why leaving was such a big deal.
- Read the books eventually. The show is incredibly faithful—probably one of the most faithful adaptations ever made—but Ferrante’s interior monologues add a layer of "oh, that’s messed up" that the screen can only hint at.
- Pay attention to the color palette. Notice how the colors start to bleed in as the characters get more money and freedom, only to wash out again when they return home.
The series is a masterpiece of pacing. It doesn't rush. It lets you sit in the silence of a dusty classroom or the chaos of a Neapolitan wedding. It’s the kind of show that stays with you long after the credits roll. You’ll find yourself thinking about your own "brilliant friend"—that person who pushed you to be better but also made you feel like you were never quite enough.
What to do next
If you haven't started, go to Max (formerly HBO Max) and find Season 1. Commit to the first three episodes. The childhood section is essential to understand the trauma that drives everything else. If you've already seen it, go back and watch the Season 4 premiere. Pay close attention to the way the new actors mirror the physical tics of the younger ones. It’s a masterclass in acting. Finally, look up the photography of Elena Ferrante’s Naples. Seeing the real-life inspirations for the rione makes the show’s production design even more impressive.
Don't wait for a remake or a "reboot." This is the definitive version of a story that defined a generation of literature.