Ratched season 1: Spoiler-free review

Ratched season 1 is as beautiful as it is haunting

Ryan Murphy fans are highly anticipating the release of Ratched on Netflix, and for good reason! The Netflix original series is a captivating ride with a brilliant cast and unpredictable story.

Ratched tells the origin story of the infamous asylum nurse we met back in the 1975 film One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, based on the novel of the same name. In the original work, she is portrayed as an evil nurse who manipulates her patients, but Ratched on Netflix presents an entirely different character.

In the Ryan Murphy series, we don’t see a heartless nurse at all. Instead, we board the journey of the exploration of what caused Mildred Ratched to fall. First introduced as a rather unlikeable yet bewitching character, Ratched is now someone admirable and a character to root for.

Ratched is unique and empowering

Don’t let our description of the complex nurse fool you, she is still not someone you want to ever cross. She is careful and calculated, you’ll never know her next move or even whose side she is on.

Ratched picks up with Mildred (Sarah Paulson) determined to get a job at a leading psychiatric hospital in Northern California. The doctor in charge there, Dr. Richard Hanover (Jon Jon Briones), has begun new experiments on the human mind.

These tests include boiling baths and lobotomy. Several scenes are disturbing, one scene even has strong American Horror Story vibes, but never does Ratched feel like it’s trying to be something else.

The game really gets rolling in episode 4, “Angel of Mercy: Part 2,” but this isn’t to say that the ride to get there is any less enchanting. Episode 4 is simply when you need to begin paying extra close attention to as Ratched begins to play with the minds of the audience. Each turn will be a surprise as we won’t know what’s Ratched’s play until she deals the cards.

If you love the series, there’s more to come! Sarah Paulson has already teased what’s ahead in an early season 2 renewal.

Ratched season 1 premieres on Sept. 17 only on Netflix.