Unpopular opinion incoming: Netflix’s “East of Eden” is one of the best book adaptation I’ve seen in years.
And I still think you need to read the book.
Let me explain.
My own copy of Steinbeck’s novel is held together with packing tape. My high school English teacher, Mrs. Delgado, handed it to me when I was sixteen and going through a rough stretch at home. She’d folded down one page and written a note in the margin: “Read this part twice.” It was the chapter about the Hebrew word “timshel”. Thou mayest. The idea that whatever your parents were, whatever runs in your blood, you still get to choose who you become.
I’ve read it six times since. So when Netflix announced Florence Pugh would star in a seven-episode series, I genuinely felt protective. Like someone was about to rearrange furniture in my childhood bedroom.
I finished the whole thing in a weekend. Here’s my honest take:
Florence Pugh as Cathy Ames. Just… wow. Cathy is one of the most chilling women in all of American literature. She lies, she burns, she abandons, and she never once looks back. In the book, she’s almost inhuman. Pugh keeps every bit of that menace, but somehow lets you glimpse the trapped, furious woman underneath. I didn’t sympathize with Cathy. But for the first time, I understood her. And I got chills every time she entered a scene.
Hoon Lee as Lee. If you’ve read the book, you know Lee is its quiet, wise heart, the Chinese cook who’s really the family’s philosopher and protector. The famous 1955 film with James Dean cut him out completely. That film was directed by Elia Kazan. This new series was created by his granddaughter, Zoe Kazan. Seventy years later, she put Lee back where he belongs. I love that so much.
But, where on earth are the Hamiltons?
Samuel Hamilton, the dirt-poor, big-hearted Irish farmer who can never find water on his own land but brings life to everyone around him, is the soul of this novel for me. Some of Steinbeck’s most beautiful writing belongs to him and his noisy, loving family. The series mostly leaves them out.
And without them, the story tilts heavily toward darkness. It becomes Cathy’s show. What you lose is the warmth, the hope, the reminder that ordinary goodness is just as powerful as evil.
So: book or series?
Watch the series. Seriously. Let Florence Pugh haunt your dreams. It’s dark, gorgeous and brilliantly acted.
But the book is still the masterpiece, because it’s simply too big for seven hours. Steinbeck didn’t only write about a dangerous woman and two troubled brothers. He wrote about a whole valley, three generations, and the decent people who keep showing up for each other even when the world is cruel.
The show gives you the shadow. The book gives you the shadow and the light.