Started February 23, 2023 · Canceled · Based on 1 season, 8 episodes through February 23, 2023 · TV-MA
The Consultant follows Craig, a game designer at CompWare, a mobile game company in downtown Los Angeles. After a child kills the company’s young boss during a school visit, the strange Regus Patoff arrives with a contract and takes control. Craig and his co-worker Elaine try to learn who Patoff is while their jobs, friendships, and lives come under his control. The season mixes dark jokes, office suspense, sexual material, and supernatural hints.
The show’s clearest social message is its repeated attack on profit-first business culture. Patoff bans remote work, fires people for illness, demands long hours, and pushes a game even after users hurt themselves trying to beat it. The story treats him as a symbol of ruthless capitalism and shows Elaine becoming more willing to harm others as she rises to power. A brief same-sex relationship appears in the office background, but the season does not center race, gender, queer identity, or party politics.
Community feedback
Was our 33% Woke rating accurate?
Breakdown
These are the editorial factors and ratings behind our score for The Consultant.
Woke representation / casting
Not present. The cast’s mix fits a present-day Los Angeles game company. The show does not present race, gender, or other casting choices as a diversity program.
0%
Woke political dialogue
Employees discuss remote work, living wages, forced overtime, and the pressure to keep a company alive. Patoff says merit is overrated and treats workers as tools for profit. The show does not use election, party, race, or gender speeches, so the political material stays tied to workplace economics.
18%
Identity-driven story themes
The show briefly says that employee Ursula has a female partner, Katherine. The relationship is not explored and does not guide the plot. Elaine’s rise is about personal choices and power, not race or gender.
10%
Western institutional / cultural critique
Patoff bans remote work, fires people over health problems, demands 16-hour days, and makes workers compete for offices. The company pushes a game even after users hurt themselves, and the season links success to cruelty, control, and profit. The story makes ruthless corporate capitalism the main social target across the season. The critique is strong and repeated, but it is not mainly about race, gender, or party politics.
42%
Woke character or canon changes
Not relevant. The show changes the novel’s structure and ending for television, but those changes serve the thriller plot. No established character, real person, or story event is changed for an identity message.
0%
Anti-woke backlash and complaints
One tiny anonymous-style X account said it quits shows with unnecessary gay or trans relationships and named The Consultant as an example. The account had no likes, and no sustained woke pile-on, boycott, review-bombing campaign, or large right-leaning spread appeared. The X search was incomplete, so the backlash evidence is fringe and thin.
12%
Creator track record context
Tony Basgallop and most of the listed directors and producers have low or mild cached woke scores. Bentley Little has described himself as a liberal Democrat who supports social justice, civil liberties, public services, and aid for poor people. Karyn Kusama has supported women filmmakers and industry diversity, but that is a smaller part of her public record. The combined creator context is a mild signal, not a main reason to avoid the show.
18%
Production
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