Count of Monte Cristo adaptation praised

PBS’s new *The Count of Monte Cristo* is drawing strong early praise from viewers and critics who say the eight-part series sticks closely to Alexandre Dumas’s novel. (pbs.org) The series began its United States broadcast run on March 22, 2026, on *Masterpiece* and is already available to stream in full for PBS Passport members. Sam Claflin plays Edmond Dantès, with Jeremy Irons as Abbé Faria. (pbs.org) PBS says the adaptation unfolds across eight episodes directed by Bille August and follows Dantès from false treason charges and imprisonment to escape, hidden treasure, and revenge under a new identity. The supporting cast includes Ana Girardot as Mercédès and Blake Ritson as Danglars. (pbs.org) The question around any new *Monte Cristo* version is whether it can handle the book’s size without flattening it into a simple revenge story. Dumas published the novel serially in 1844 to 1846, and its plot turns on betrayal, politics, money, imprisonment, and reinvention over many years. (britannica.com) That helps explain the reaction to this version’s format. An eight-episode run gives the story more room than a standard feature film, and reviewers have pointed to that scale when describing it as unusually close to the source. (collider.com) Television critics have not been unanimous, but the early reviews tilt positive. Metacritic listed two positive reviews and one mixed review in its first batch, including a 90 from *Collider*, while *The Wall Street Journal* said the series improves once Edmond reaches prison and *The Guardian* criticized the script. (metacritic.com) Coverage comparing the premiere with the novel has also focused on fidelity. *TV Insider* said the first episode stays “pretty loyal” to the book and called the production largely character-driven, with location shooting in France, Malta, and Italy. (tvinsider.com) This is also not a brand-new production arriving first on PBS. Metacritic says the series previously premiered in the United Kingdom on U and U&Drama on August 2, 2025, after earlier runs in Europe, before PBS and the PBS *Masterpiece* Prime Video channel picked it up in the United States. (metacritic.com) For PBS, the timing fits a familiar strategy: take a durable literary property, cast recognizable actors, and give it enough screen time to play out the original structure. For viewers who wanted a version centered on Dantès’s long transformation rather than a compressed action plot, that appears to be the selling point. (pbs.org; tvinsider.com) The result, at least in the first weeks of its United States release, is that a 19th-century serial about patience and payback has found a modern audience by taking its time. (britannica.com; pbs.org)