You might scratch your head over this ‘Mosquito Coast’

In 1981, Paul Theroux’s novel “The Mosquito

Coast” was published. Positive reviews, multiple awards and a widespread reading audience soon followed. It’s a great book. An idealistic dreamer who believes the excessive American way of life and its blatant consumerism is all wrong, takes himself and his family off the grid and moves to another country to start over on his own terms.

In 1986, Australian director Peter Weir, with a script by Paul Schrader, featured Harrison Ford as the dreamer, Allie Fox, in a trimmed down, over-acted adaptation of the book. It stayed close to the source material, but never got to its essence.

Now we’ve got a seven-part series on Apple TV+, starring Justin Theroux (the author’s nephew) as Fox, an idealistic dreamer who steals a bunch of money, goes on the run with his family when the government comes looking for him, and is chased in another country by vicious members of a drug cartel.

Wait, what? This is not “The Mosquito Coast” that Paul Theroux wrote or Weir directed. It’s like an alternate-universe version of the book/movie.

Or, maybe, if you give it a heaping benefit of the doubt, you could convince yourself that it’s sort of a prequel, a story that might eventually lead up to the one you know.

But enough (deserved) quibbling. The series is pretty good. It has some fine acting. The best of it comes from Justin Theroux as the complicated, well-meaning but misguided, gentle but strict, excitable and often bewildered Allie Fox. And in later episodes, British actor Ian Hart plays Bill Lee, a splendidly wicked, murderous, pork pie hat-wearing, dressed-inblack hitman hipster who is hunting down Fox.

Running approximately six hours over the seven episodes, there’s a lot of story to tell. The series wastes no time getting the family in flight, but only hints at why the government is after them — although more details fall into place later on. One disappointment is that, with the luxury of such a lengthy script, there aren’t many examples of character arcs.

Is this must-see TV? No, it is not. Is it a well-written, well-acted, sprawling story that sometimes makes you think about things, sometimes has you at the edge of your seat, and provides an offbeat look into family dynamics? Yes, it is.

“The Mosquito Coast” is on Apple TV+.