‘Vladimir’ review: Rachel Weisz goes full ‘Fleabag’

those of Netflix Vladimir is too brazen for his own good.

The limited series, based on creator Julia May Jonas’ 2022 novel of the same name, combines an intoxicating story of desire with a #MeToo controversy on a small college campus. In theory, it is a hotbed of envy and controversy ripe for debate. In practice, VladimirThe artist’s casualness attenuates his acuity.

What is this Vladimir about?

Rachel Weisz and Leo Woodall in “Vladimir”.
Credit: Netflix

Rachel Weisz plays the anonymous fifty-something creative writing professor at the heart of Vladimir. After 30 years of teaching at the same liberal arts school, she came to a terrifying realization: She had “lost the ability to captivate.” (Weisz, on the other hand, is as captivating as ever.) Her students consider her out of touch with reality. Her husband John (John Slattery), a fellow professor, constantly sees other women in an open marriage from which only he benefits. He is also under investigation for past relationships with students, putting his marriage under the microscope. (As part of the arrangement, Vladimir(The protagonist knew about these alliances, and she doesn’t understand how a consensual affair could be bad.)

Enter Vladimir Vladinski (Leo Woodall), the English department’s new star professor. Young, handsome, and thoughtful enough to give up his chair to Weisz’s professor at a faculty meeting, he becomes the object of all her fantasies. His marriage to new assistant professor Cynthia (Jessica Henwick) doesn’t stop his desire. That doesn’t seem to stop Vladimir from taking an interest in it either. Soon, VladimirThe lead actress’s life is in a double downward spiral as she considers both the consequences of John’s actions and her new erotic obsession.

Are VladimirAre breaks in the fourth wall irritating or enlightening?

Rachel Weisz in “Vladimir”.
Credit: Netflix

Vladimir gives viewers a front-row seat to its protagonist’s frenetic inner monologue by having her deliver her thoughts directly to the camera. Listen, Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s Flea bag doesn’t possess the art of breaking the fourth wall, but it’s impossible not to see his influence in the professor’s asides. If you’re going to use a technique that’s almost synonymous with yet another TV show about a spiraling, complicated, nameless woman, you better bring something new to it.

To his honor, Vladimir tries, but doesn’t really succeed.

Where Fleabag’s fourth wall breaks come from his intense self-awareness, the protagonist’s fourth wall breaks are entirely about self-deception. For the most part, she treats viewers like students who need to be hand-held. She explains why her husband’s business was doing well, attributing the victims’ anxiety to spending too much time on the Internet. She sings her own praises and emphasizes when she makes a pun, making sure we don’t miss a drop of her apparent brilliance.

Of course, viewers can see that she lies often. Sometimes the camera even has fun proving her wrong. In VladimirIn the first episode of , she brags that her fellow professors devoured the “fuck you salad” she brought to a department meeting. As she walks out, the camera pans to reveal the salad, untouched. It’s a clever technique, which allows us to inhabit the role of the many skeptical students that the professor will encounter. Again Vladimir rarely comes back. Instead, as the series progresses, the protagonist’s asides move away from professorial monologue to panicked mid-conversation interjections about her discussions with Vladimir. Here, the Flea bag the similarities become overwhelming and the lighter tone oddly chafes against the show’s more intense subject matter.

Vladimir struggling with sex and substance.

Rachel Weisz and Leo Woodall in “Vladimir”.
Credit: Netflix

While the weight of VladimirIf the emphasis is on its protagonist’s obsession with her colleague, the series always takes place against the backdrop of a university sex scandal. Because the show is so rooted in its point of view (and doesn’t see the problem in these cases), the victims themselves get little scrutiny.

Examining all facets of the scandal is not really VladimirBut this bias is another example of a more worsening trend in how film and television depict stories of asymmetrical power dynamics and sexual politics on college campuses. Like that of 2025 After the hunt, Vladimir focuses primarily on how people close to the accused are affected and how they must learn to adjust their expectations because they appeared in “a different time.” Even the new HBO comedy Roosterwhich also debuts this week, flirts with these dynamics through a professor-graduate student relationship. (He dodges several bullets because the teacher has never taught this particular student.) It’s tiring to see these stories repeatedly used as teachable moments for people who don’t want to learn. In VladimirIn the case of, it’s particularly tiring to see them packed with a multitude of winking fourth-wall breaks and mildly ironic girlboss needle drops.

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Aside from the heavier topics, even though it is a study of a woman’s desire, Vladimir is strangely asexual. The series finds some humor in its protagonist’s infatuation. Persistent tugging at Vladimir’s neck and arms is accompanied by sparking noises and heavy breathing, while her panic over the meaning of an emoji transforms her from teacher to schoolgirl in the blink of an eye. Yet his fantasies are disappointingly realized: clichéd sexual encounters, rendered in quick, flashy dream sequences.

It’s always hard not to get drawn into Weisz and Woodall’s game of cat and mouse, especially as the professor performs a series of moves that will make you cringe. Yet as an erotic thriller and a portrait of the repercussions of sexual misconduct allegations, Vladimir is a reflection of its protagonist’s worst nightmare: it fails to captivate.

Vladimir is now streaming on Netflix.