(Image credit: CTV)
You might know Billy Campbell as the hero of "The Rocketeer" or as the brooding mayoral candidate on AMC's "The Killing," but you almost certainly missed him delivering some of the best, saddest work of his career in a hidden gem available on Hulu.In "The Cardinal," he plays homicide detective John Cardinal in frozen northern Ontario who whispers half his lines, as if saying them any louder might crack him open. And that's just the start: Karine Vanasse plays the partner secretly assigned to investigate him for corruption. We doubt you've ever seen it (or even heard of it), but it really is that good.When the Toronto Star reviewed the first season, the headline dubbed it "The Killing for Canada." It absolutely holds up to that comparison, except "Cardinal" swaps political intrigue for a sense of creeping dread. It dares to be slow and unbearably tense at the same time, which is exactly what makes it such a great watch. If you are ready to dive in, you're in luck: All four seasons are streaming right now on Hulu.What is ‘Cardinal’ about?John Cardinal (Billy Campbell) is a homicide detective in Algonquin Bay, a small, frozen city in northern Ontario. Months before the series opens, he was pulled off the homicide squad for refusing to let go of a missing-teenager case everyone else had filed away as a runaway. Except he was sure she didn't run.Then her body turns up, frozen, in an abandoned mine, and Cardinal is quietly proven right and handed the case back. He gets a new partner, Lise Delorme (Karine Vanasse), who's been hired to build a corruption case against him. The department thinks he's been on a local drug dealer's payroll, and Delorme is there to catch him at it.Cardinal becomes convinced that a serial killer is working in the area, and the two of them are stuck solving one murder while one of them secretly tries to bury the other. Oh, and this is only season 1; the show runs for four seasons, each adapting a different Giles Blunt novel, so there's even more to devour after the first season is finished.Why I recommend streaming ‘Cardinal’
