Acorn TV's 'Monsieur Spade' Looks Très Très Mystérieux

Acorn TV is known for its British series like Bloodlands, Steeltown Murders, and Mrs. Sidhu Investigates. It also has quite a few popular French series as well, like Candice Renoir, Balthazar, and Missing Angel. But its most recent hits seem to combine the two, with Cannes Confidential, The Madame Blanc Mysteries, and now the upcoming Monsieur Spade. Starring Clive Owen (A Murder at the End of the World), the new series takes the iconic Dashiell Hammett hard-boiled private detective Sam Spade, famously played by Humphrey Bogart, and brings him back for a new generation.

Like so many reimaginings, this new six-part series is set decades after the events of the original film, though not in the present day, as that would be a little too far in the future for Spade, who was in his 30s in The Maltese Falcon. Instead, the show moves up twenty-five years to the 1960s, so it's still a period piece, where the now retired Spade has decamped to France, where he is known as M. Spade, and lives a quiet life. At least until murders find their way to his door once more, and he can't help but take up the case.

The series, the brainchild of The Queen's Gambit creator Scott Frank, was taken to market after Netflix turned his Walter Tevis novel adaptation into a surprise hit, but didn't sell until 2022 when AMC Networks picked it up. It was first set to stream just on AMC+ and air on AMC's linear channel, but that quickly expanded to include sister network Acorn TV. All three will now air and stream the series simultaneously.