Netflix has released the teaser for Kasper Bajon's four-part series starring Agnieszka Grochowska and Agnieszka Żulewska. It arrives November 18.
In 1988, a police major and a psychiatrist make decisions that end their friendship. Twenty-five years later, the man at the centre of those decisions is about to leave prison, and both women have to face what they did. That is the engine of The Law of Beasts, the Polish drama Netflix has just given a teaser and a date: November 18.
It is a compact piece of television. Four episodes, 45 minutes each, directed by Kasper Bajon, who also wrote it with Anna Kasińska. Netflix describes it as a series about the limits of friendship and justice, and about the responsibilities of those who represent the state and its institutions.
Two women, one case
The story runs through two perspectives. Major Anna Bersz leads the 1988 investigation into the murders of four boys. Her friend Agnieszka Grabska, a psychiatrist, is asked to assess the criminal responsibility of the suspect, Mariusz Trynkiewicz. Time is short, the system is pushing, and the choices they make cost them each other.
The second half of the story jumps ahead a quarter of a century. Anna is now a government official. Agnieszka is a respected psychiatric expert. When the convicted murderer’s release comes into view, the case returns as what Netflix calls an unresolved legal and social issue, and neither woman can look away from it.
The material is real and heavy. The series is inspired by the case of Mariusz Trynkiewicz and the events that led to the legislation known in Poland as the “Beasts Act.” Anna and Agnieszka, however, are entirely fictional. Their friendship and personal histories were invented for the show, which lets the writers examine the moral and legal fallout through people who had to decide on behalf of institutions, rather than through a documentary retelling.
The leads
Casting two Agnieszkas in the central roles is a happy accident of Polish naming, and the drama needs both of them. Agnieszka Grochowska plays Anna, a determined major in Poland’s then police force who wants the perpetrator convicted. Years later, as an official, she gets pulled back in by her sense of responsibility for other people’s safety.
Agnieszka Żulewska plays Grabska, the psychiatrist whose job is an impartial assessment of the suspect’s mental state. Her professional duty runs into outside pressure and a clear expectation of a particular outcome. One woman is paid to want a verdict. The other is paid not to want anything. It is easy to see why that arrangement would not survive the case.
Michał Pawlik plays Trynkiewicz, the convicted murderer whose approaching release reopens the dispute over what should happen to him.
Who built it
For a series this short, the crew list is serious. Entrego is the production company, with Edyta Krajewska producing. Bartłomiej Kaczmarek is director of photography and Piotr Waglewski composes. Anna Marzęda handles production design, Magdalena Bem-Jankowska designs the costumes, and Daria Siejak is in charge of makeup and hair. Jacek Dąbrowski-Udziela is line producer.
Those names matter here because the story spans two eras. A drama that moves from 1988 to a quarter-century later lives or dies on its production design, wardrobe and hair, and on whether the same two women look and feel like the same people carrying different weight. That is exactly the department work this crew has been hired to do.
The format also suits the subject. At 45 minutes an episode, the whole series comes to about three hours, short enough to watch in one sitting and, given the premise, probably hard to shake afterwards. All four episodes land together on November 18, 2026, only on Netflix.
The question the series puts at its centre is a hard one: how a society protects itself while keeping to the rule of law. Netflix has framed it as something two friends had to answer personally, and then live with.
Via Netflix
