The season of scammers is upon us, and Hulu has entered the ring with their Elizabeth Holmes scripted series, The Dropout. The show follows the tumultuous story of disgraced Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, who duped the science community, along with the rest of the world, when she made false promises about the company’s mission and technology. The series dropped its first three episodes on March 3rd, with the rest of the episodes premiering weekly on Thursdays through April 7th. The season will consist of eight episodes.
Amanda Seyfried joined the cast after Kate McKinnon dropped out (no pun intended) of the project last year. Seyfried plays Holmes, complete with her bizarre accent (not as bizarre as Anna Delvey, of course) who drops out of Standford to pursue a biotech company that never really got off the ground, though Holmes somehow navigated the press to make it seem like she was making scientific breakthroughs. Holmes had promised to change the way blood tests were performed and analyzed, but it all turned out to be fake.
In an interview with UPROXX, director Michael Showalter said Holmes’ story is so fascinating and heartbreaking because people wanted her to be right and real, but she was faking the whole time. “You have The New York Times putting her on the cover of the Sunday magazine and you have every single news outlet fawning over her, and you have major international figures getting in line to shake her hand and sing her praises and all of this stuff. There was nothing there. They never got it off the ground. It’s not just like it was close. They were faking it.”
The first three episodes of The Dropout are streaming on Hulu and Starz on Disney+ now, with new episodes every Thursday.
