First Look: Benedict Cumberbatch Plays a Desperate Father Looking for His Son in Netflix’s ERIC

This spring, Benedict Cumberbatch is returning to Netflix with another starring turn, following his involvement in 2023’s The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar. On May 30, 2024, the streaming service will release ERIC, from writer and creator Abi Morgan, a series that Netflix describes as “a new emotional drama…following the desperate search of father when his nine-year-old son Edgar disappears” on his way to school. Cumberbatch plays the father Vincent, a successful puppeteer and children’s show creator, who hopes to use his son’s drawings of ERIC, a blue monster puppet, to get Edgar to come home. ERIC not only follows Vincent’s search, but how it makes his life unravel and puts his relationships on shaky ground.

Morgan is known as a playwright and screenwriter, notably on projects such as Suffragette, Split, and The Iron Lady.

ERIC hits Netflix on May 30, 2024. For more, check out the full press release below.

Set in 1980s New York, Eric is a new emotional thriller from Abi Morgan following the desperate search of a father when his nine-year-old son disappears one morning on the way to school. Vincent, one of New York’s leading puppeteers and creator of the hugely popular children’s television show, ‘Good Day Sunshine,’ struggles to cope with the loss of his son, Edgar, becoming increasingly distressed and volatile. Full of self-loathing and guilt around Edgar’s disappearance, he clings to his son’s drawings of a blue monster puppet, ERIC, convinced that if he can get ERIC on TV then Edgar will come home. As Vincent’s progressively destructive behavior alienates his family, his work colleagues, and the detectives trying to help him, it’s Eric, a delusion of necessity, who becomes his only ally in the pursuit to bring his son home.