The Rainmaker | Daily Mail Online

Classy John Grisham thriller starring Rivals’ Milo Callaghan

Year: 2025

Certificate: 15

Watch now on ITVX

Based on a 1995 John Grisham novel, this energetic ten-part legal drama follows plucky new law graduate Rudy Baylor (Rivals’ Milo Callaghan) and his dreams of being a rainmaker, the kind of lawyer who secures big multimillion-dollar wins. Fired from his first job at a prestigious law firm, Rudy has to settle for chasing every small win he can for the personal injury firm of Jocelyn ‘Bruiser’ Stone (Lana Parrilla) where he learns the ropes from Stone’s loveably dodgy paralegal Deck Shifflet (PJ Byrne).

Rudy’s girlfriend Sarah (Madison Iseman) keeps her job at the hotshot firm that sacked Rudy and impresses senior partner Leo Drummond (John Slattery). The two firms operate in very different ways, with Rudy’s ‘ambulance chasers’ scrambling for work piecemeal among ordinary folk, while Sarah’s top-tier firm use their might to protect the wealthy elite. These two worlds will collide, giving Rudy his shot at making it rain money and face Slattery’s Drummond, the man who fired him, in court.

It’s a smartly played and thrilling show, with Mad Men’s Slattery on especially reptilian form and The Lincoln Lawyer’s Parrilla earning that ‘Bruiser’ nickname. The big draw is British actor Callaghan, who has all the boyish charm and emerging-star quality of the young Matt Damon when he played Rudy – the ambitious underdog who goes from chasing sticks to leading the pack – in the 1997 film adaptation. (Ten episodes)