- Network
- Apple TV+
- Creator
- Kelly Marcel
- Director
- Melina Matsoukas
- Episodes
- 8
- Original run
- September 8 to October 13, 2023
- Lead
- LaKeith Stanfield as Apollo Kagwa
- Source novel
- Victor LaValle, 2021
- Format
- Horror fantasy limited series
Watch Order
0 / 8 watchedEight episodes in release order. One continuous story, so there is no separate chronological order.
About The Changeling
The Changeling is an American horror fantasy series created by Kelly Marcel for Apple TV+, based on Victor LaValle's novel of the same name, with Melina Matsoukas directing. It premiered on September 8, 2023 with its first three episodes released together, then ran weekly through October 13 for eight episodes in total.
LaKeith Stanfield plays Apollo Kagwa, a used book dealer in New York, and Clark Backo plays his pregnant wife Emma. The story starts in the aftermath of the birth of their first child, when Emma does something terrible, and Apollo's search for her becomes a slow, domestic horror about a marriage and a city rather than a monster hunt.
The show sits closer to psychological horror than to genre fare. It is a contained eight episode story with a single arc, and nothing in it depends on knowing the book, although the novel's setting and themes are echoed in the adaptation. Adina Porter plays Lillian Kagwa, Apollo's mother, and the series keeps the focus on the two of them rather than on any creature in the background.
Good to know
Watch all eight episodes in order. It is one continuous story with no flashbacks to sort and no separate chronology to worry about, so the order is simply the release order.
The first three episodes landed on the same day, which is worth knowing if you are tracking the weekly release pattern.
The show is an adaptation, but a loose one. LaValle's novel was published in 2021 and the series changes names, details and setting, so the book is not a substitute for watching and the series is not a version of the book you already know.
If you want more of the same register, the domestic horror of the first half sits closer to the tradition than anything in the second half does.
