What to Watch: Andrew Lincoln's 'Coldwater' Brings Bad Decisions to a Quiet Village
- The Real Perspectives
- Jan 9
- 5 min read
Reel Perspectives
January 9, 2026
A gripping slow-burn thriller that lets Andrew Lincoln shine — and keeps you leaning forward every week.
Coldwater Is Ready to Test Your Moral Compass
If you’ve ever watched a handsome man make one bad decision, then another, then fully double down because he desperately wants to believe he’s finally becoming the person he’s supposed to be… congratulations.
Coldwater was made just for you.
Streaming in the U.S. on Paramount+ w/ Showtime on January 9, the six-episode psychological thriller stars Andrew Lincoln in a role that’s guaranteed to pull in The Walking Dead fans—and then quietly, methodically wreck them. This isn’t a show about zombies or survivalist heroics. It’s about shame, identity, toxic masculinity, and the very real consequences of freezing when it matters most.
If you’re thinking, surely it can’t get worse from here…
Trust. It absolutely can.
Why Coldwater Gets Messy Fast
Coldwater opens with a moment so unsettling you’ll feel it in your chest—and immediately start yelling at the screen. John, played by Andrew Lincoln, is a stay-at-home dad who witnesses a violent assault and freezes. No intervention. No action. Just standing there.
And in that single moment, his entire sense of manhood, morality, and self-worth caves in.
Ashamed and spiraling, John uproots his wife, Fiona, and their children from London and drags them to a remote Scottish village, convinced that isolation will somehow fix what accountability couldn’t. For John, the move is about reclaiming control and feeling “solid” again. For Fiona—played with sharp intelligence and quiet authority by Indira Varma—it’s a reluctant reset, an attempt to hold a fractured marriage together while finally prioritizing her own ambitions as a writer.
What they find instead is a community that smiles warmly, asks all the right questions, and absolutely does not feel right.
Enter the neighbor.
Tommy is charismatic, confident, deeply embedded in village life, and wrapped in the language of faith and respectability. He’s a husband, a father, a community leader, and the organizer of a men’s book (and uncomfortable Bible) group that radiates trust and authority. John is immediately impressed—borderline enamored. Fiona, meanwhile, clocks the vibes in record time. Her instincts are razor-sharp, but John’s hunger to be seen, validated, and chosen keeps overriding every red flag waving directly in his face.
Opposite Lincoln, Ewen Bremner delivers a masterclass in polite menace as Tommy. He smiles softly. He speaks calmly. He never raises his voice. And yet every interaction feels like a test you didn’t realize you were taking. Bremner lets the cracks show slowly—in pauses, glances, and that unsettling calm that always precedes chaos.
The wider ensemble deepens the atmospheric level of unease. A fantastic Eve Myles plays Tommy's wife, Rebecca. Lorn Macdonald brings volatility and unpredictability as Angus, while Samuel Bottomley adds quiet tension as Cameron. Abigail Lawrie’s Moria-Jane reflects how the village’s younger generation absorbs—and mirrors—the warped moral framework surrounding them. Each performance reinforces how isolation and groupthink allow something rotten to thrive unchecked.
The relationship between John and Tommy is where Coldwater truly brings you in. Their dynamic is enthralled with admiration, projection, manipulation, and an unspoken power struggle that grows more dangerous with each episode. There’s even a streak of dark humor running through their scenes—the kind that makes you laugh and then immediately feel uneasy for doing so.
As the series unfolds, Coldwater’s postcard-perfect calm begins to erode.
Welcomes turn into whispers. Trust grows brittle. The village’s politeness becomes its sharpest weapon. The show thrives on contrast—idyllic landscapes versus creeping dread, friendliness versus hostility, brotherhood versus obsession—creating an atmosphere where danger feels inevitable precisely because it’s dressed up as decency.
Andrew Lincoln, Reimagined
If you know Andrew Lincoln as Rick Grimes—the gun-toting, growling survivalist at the center of The Walking Dead—Coldwater is about to flip that image on its head in the most unsettling way.
Here, Lincoln trades apocalypse bravado for vulnerability, authority for insecurity, and heroics for emotional paralysis. His John isn’t here to save anyone. He’s awkward, brittle, deeply unsure of himself—and painfully human. This isn’t a fall-from-grace arc so much as a slow reveal of how little confidence he had to begin with.
Lincoln’s performance is rooted in shame, self-doubt, and that quiet, nagging fear of not measuring up—emotionally, socially, or morally. It’s restrained, internal, and all the more devastating for it. For longtime fans, it’s a reminder that Lincoln’s range has always extended far beyond apocalypse-era masculinity—and that watching him sit with discomfort can be just as gripping as watching him swing an axe.
In short: this isn’t Rick Grimes with a new accent. It’s Andrew Lincoln leaning into discomfort, and that’s where the magic is.
Under the Water: The Mind Behind Coldwater
At the core of Coldwater is writer and creator David Ireland, whose theater roots shape a series far more interested in pressure than spectacle—specifically how people behave when they’re isolated, observed, and quietly coming apart.
Developed during the pandemic, the six-part thriller draws directly from that era’s claustrophobia, anxiety, and emotional dislocation, using them to explore masculinity, community, and moral collapse; you can feel it in every episode, in the sense of being trapped with your thoughts, craving connection while distrusting everyone around you, and watching polite social rituals mask something far more volatile.
Several episodes are also written and co-directed by Andrew Cumming, whose visual restraint perfectly complements Ireland’s scripts, keeping tension simmering rather than exploding—until it absolutely has to. That character-first approach is further reinforced by Andrew Lincoln, who serves not only as the star but also as an executive producer, ensuring John’s unraveling feels earned, layered, and deeply human rather than sensationalized.
The result is a thriller that understands the most unsettling truth of all: the real danger isn’t what announces itself—it’s what lives just beneath the surface, waiting for the right moment to rise.
Why Coldwater Has Us Hooked
The trailer for Coldwater lets you know immediately: this isn’t about jump scares or cheap twists—it’s about the tension, and it never lets up. Built on long silences, loaded stares, and that unmistakable feeling that something is wrong even when everyone’s smiling, the footage leans all the way into discomfort.
It highlights the unsettling push-and-pull between John and Tommy while quietly reminding us how fast isolation, ego, and the need to belong can turn into a problem. You don’t need all the answers to be hooked—you just need that creeping sense of sir, this is not okay.
Watch the official trailer here:
Coldwater is now streaming exclusively on Paramount+ with Showtime, with new episodes dropping weekly through the series finale on February 13, 2026.
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