HBO's War is Industry with lawyers — and actual lawyers are rolling their eyes
The legal drama is a genuine hit with critics and viewers. The one audience it lost is the one that does this for a living.
By the usual measures, HBO has its fall hit. War, George Kay's anthology drama about two rival London law firms fighting a monster divorce case — Dominic West as the tech-mogul husband, Sienna Miller as the film-star wife — premiered October 1, holds 87% on Rotten Tomatoes), and Collider reports it has become one of streaming's biggest current shows. A second season, with Marisa Tomei, Kelly Macdonald, David Harewood, and Richard Schiff on a defamation case, was ordered back in May.
The comparison viewers keep reaching for is HBO's own finance drama: a thread on r/television literally titled the show "Industry but with lawyers." Inside that thread, though, the people with law degrees staged a mutiny.
Objection, sustained
The angriest review came from inside the profession:
"The premise is awful. It's not just far-fetched, so many plot points in it could never ever ever happen in real life. Not a single lawyer in either the US or UK was consulted. … As a UK lawyer it actually makes me genuinely annoyed at how terrible it is!"
— a commenter on r/television
Whether anyone was consulted, we don't actually know — the show's credits list six writers and no publicized legal advisors. The funniest diagnosis in the thread didn't need credentials at all, just an ear for how the dialogue works:
"You can tell because before every legal scene one lawyer will explain to the other lawyer what's at stake in a really serious voice. It would be like if they made a show about building engineers and every once in a while one engineer says to another 'it's crucial that we get these plans right, otherwise the building could collapse.'"
— a commenter on r/television
One viewer in the thread reported his wife's verdict, which may be the most efficient review the show gets: it's Suits trying to be serious.
Critics have War at 87 percent and HBO ordered season 2 in May. The thread's practicing lawyers filed a dissent.
Does it matter?
For the show's health, probably not — doctors spent eight seasons explaining why House would lose its license, and Suits itself became a streaming phenomenon a decade after lawyers stopped complaining about it. Professional fury is usually a side effect of a profession getting a hit show at all.
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For your queue, it depends what you were promised. If the pitch you heard was the next Industry — a show praised precisely for how real its trading floor felt — the lawyers' testimony is worth hearing before you commit eight episodes. War is a glossy, well-acted fight in expensive rooms; the people who work in those rooms say the realism ends at the set dressing.
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