General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Before

Before is a psychological thriller series that Apple TV+ released in 2024, created by Sarah Thorp. Billy Crystal plays Eli, a psychiatrist for children who, having recently been widowed by the death of his wife Lynn, meets a young boy in distress, Noah, who appears linked in unsettling ways to Eli's history.¹ The 10-episode limited series premiered on October 25, 2024, with its first two episodes, and ran weekly through the finale on December 20, 2024.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Format	10-episode limited series on Apple TV+; episodes of roughly 29 minutes¹^•²
Run	Premiered October 25, 2024 (two episodes); finale "Before" aired December 20, 2024¹^•³
Lead cast	Billy Crystal as Dr. Eli Adler; Judith Light as Lynn Adler; Jacobi Jupe as Noah Sawyer; Rosie Perez as Denise; Maria Dizzia as Barbara; Ava Lalezarzadeh as Cleo²
Creator	Sarah Thorp, who serves as showrunner, writer, and executive producer¹
Production	Paramount Television Studios; executive producers include Crystal, Eric Roth, Adam Bernstein, and Jet Wilkinson¹
Reception	Metacritic Metascore of 46 ("Mixed or Average") from 20 critic reviews; user score 4.3⁴
Rating	TV-MA⁵

Spoilers

Premise

The series follows Eli Adler (Billy Crystal), a child psychiatrist nearing the end of his career who has recently lost his wife Lynn (Judith Light) to suicide; his grief brings nightmares and waking visions of her.⁵ A silent young boy, Noah (Jacobi Jupe), mysteriously appears at Eli's front steps twice, exhibiting odd behavior.⁵ Eli learns that Noah is a troubled foster child living with Denise (Rosie Perez), and is then assigned Noah's case for evaluation.⁵ As Eli works with the boy, Noah's visions grow more terrifying and he becomes more destructive, and Eli comes to realize that he and Noah are connected in some frightening way that he cannot explain.⁵

Apple describes the show as an "atmospheric, character-driven psychological thriller" with supernatural elements.¹ The Guardian's Lucy Mangan characterized it as "more of a mood piece than a full-on ghost or gory horror story," at least as interested in manifestations of guilt in real life as in the supernatural narrative.⁴

Cast and characters

Billy Crystal as Dr. Eli Adler, a grieving child psychiatrist²
Judith Light as Lynn Adler, Eli's late wife²
Jacobi Jupe as Noah Sawyer, a troubled foster child²
Rosie Perez as Denise, Noah's foster parent²
Maria Dizzia as Barbara²
Ava Lalezarzadeh as Cleo²

The supporting cast listed by Metacritic includes Hope Davis as Jane, Sakina Jaffrey as Gail, Miriam Shor as Sue Ann, and Robert Townsend as Jackson.⁴

Episodes

The ten episodes, with air dates listed by epguides, are:³

"The Imposter" (October 25, 2024)
"The Scientist" (October 25, 2024)
"The Liar" (November 1, 2024)
"Symbols and Signs" (November 8, 2024)
"Folie à Deux" (November 15, 2024)
"Fever Dream" (November 22, 2024)
"The Power of Belief" (November 27, 2024)
"When We Dead Awaken" (December 6, 2024)
"And the Darkness Was Called Night" (December 13, 2024)
"Before" (December 20, 2024)

The finale centers on Eli racing against time to save Noah.²

Development and production

The project was first reported in June 2022, when Billy Crystal was announced as headlining and executive producing the Apple TV+ limited series, written by Sarah Thorp and at that stage set to be directed by Barry Levinson, with Eric Roth also attached as executive producer.⁶ It marked Crystal's first live-action television role since FX's The Comedians in 2015; he had previously appeared in more than 70 episodes of ABC's Soap in the late 1970s and early 1980s.⁶

In a November 2024 interview, Crystal described the premise's origin: he and Eric Roth, the Academy Award-winning screenwriter of Forrest Gump, "hit on the idea of this troubled psychiatrist working with this young boy," and Roth recommended the young writer Sarah Thorp.⁷ Time reported that Thorp credits Crystal with dreaming up the premise.⁸

Production halt. In June 2023, production on the series was shut down until the Writers Guild strike ended, after WGA picketing had temporarily stopped filming in Hoboken, New Jersey, earlier that month.⁹ By the time of release, Adam Bernstein was the pilot director and Jet Wilkinson the producing director, with Thorp as showrunner.¹ TheTVDB credits Wilkinson with directing four episodes, David Petrarca and Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour two each, and Zetna Fuentes and Bernstein one each.¹⁰

Reception

Critical response was mixed to negative. On Metacritic, season 1 holds a Metascore of 46, "Mixed or Average," based on 20 critic reviews, with 1 positive, 12 mixed, and 7 negative; the user score is 4.3 based on 15 ratings.⁴ The Guardian gave 80, praising the grief-stricken atmosphere and calling Crystal "brilliant."⁴ At the low end, Time gave 10, judging the series "emotionally shallow" and "chronically boring" across its ten episodes.⁴ RogerEbert.com gave 30, finding it disjointed at best and calling the supernatural elements a detraction from what could have been an intriguing detective story.⁴^•¹¹ Newsday's Verne Gay wrote that the ending was at least different, but "the beginning and everything in between" were the problem.⁴

Common Sense Media's review described a dark, character-driven story whose "exceedingly slow narrative pace" fails to sustain tension across the roughly 30-minute installments, with the same imagery and symbols repeated without new information until the final two episodes.⁵ The site rated the show for ages 16 and up, flagging intense and frightening scenes, violence, and mature themes of child and adult mental health, suicide, grief, guilt, and the death of a child.⁵

Status

The series aired as a standalone limited series, and several listings mark it as ended or canceled after its single season.³^•¹² One tracking site reports its return status as unknown, with no confirmed renewal or return date announced after the December 20, 2024 finale.¹³

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Series and fictional screen worlds › Scripted television and comedy series › Drama and prestige series (individual series) › Science fiction, horror, and supernatural

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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