“Focuses on the different facets of womanhood and human connection“

After the success of The Farewell, Lulu Wang’s next project, Expats, is a six-episode limited series that follows the lives of three women in Hong Kong, and it will break the audience’s hearts. Wang’s directorial debut is about identity, culture, and the immigrant experiences of a Chinese-American woman who returns to China to say goodbye to her grandmother. In this limited series, Wang focuses on the different facets of womanhood and human connection. It’s a devastating series that explores women’s privileged and underprivileged lives, splitting into two time periods to understand the mystery that slowly unfolds.

Expats reveals the tragic and emotional stories of Margaret, Hilary and Mercy. Margaret Woo (Nicole Kidman) is a mother of three children, who left her job as an architect in America and moved to Hong Kong for her husband, Clarke (Brian Tee), and his new job. A year ago, Margaret and Clarke’s youngest son, Gus (Connor James), goes missing at the night market. Clarke tries to hold the pieces in his family together by taking care of their other children, Daisy (Tiana Gowen) and Philip (Bodhi del Rosario). Margaret used to be close friends with her neighbour, Hilary Starr (Sarayu Blue), but they’ve grown distant since Margaret accused her husband, David (Jack Huston), of involvement in Gus’s disappearance. Hilary’s relationship with David crumbles because they can’t agree on having kids together. Mercy (Ji-young Yoo) is a twenty-something Korean-American in Hong Kong to have a fresh start. These women are connected because of one event and the tragedy that haunts them for the next year. 

Wang carefully unwinds the details of their lives, and how the characters cope with their crises. There’s no rush to get to the centre of the mystery, but Wang and her team patiently reveal how all three of the characters are connected with Gus’s disappearance and the aftermath of it. Margaret floats around the city, amidst chaotic life. She rents an apartment and bathes in the tub to find some peace in her life and find the missing pieces in Gus’s disappearance. 

In another episode, Wang switches the focus to Hilary and her family. Hilary battles with David’s infidelity, the prospect of parenthood, and her mother (Sudha Bhuchar), who nitpicks every aspect of her life. This episode gives an insight into Hilary’s crisis, as she tries to keep a happy face for everybody else. One of the most memorable scenes delivered by Blue is when her character and the mother are stuck inside an elevator. These two characters discuss Hilary’s childhood and the pain she had to endure while watching her mother being abused by her husband. Wang shows the audience enough sympathy for these characters and even glimpses into the stories of people whose stories are untold. 

While the upper class gets to live in luxury, the streets are crowded with Filipino domestic help. Wang and her team not only reveal the interconnected stories of these women but extend a glimpse towards a different perspective. Margaret’s housemaid, Essie (Ruby Ruiz), is like family to her. Puri (Amelyn Pardenilla), Hilary’s live-in maid, prepares for a singing competition. Both Margaret and Hilary are unaware of their domestic housemaids’ lives, especially Essie’s who has been grieving the disappearance of Gus for a year. All four of their lives are vastly different and portray the unequal relationship between the upper class and domestic workers. 

Expats is not just about the missing child, even though the series begins with that mystery. It acknowledges the realities of racism, class differences, and the complexities of motherhood from many perspectives. Wang shows how these struggles and losses aren’t something that we are supposed to go through alone; it is a universal experience. While the series might take some time to unfold the mystery and the aftermath, Expats shows compassion and kindness to the sadness of life’s ups and downs.