Admit It, Paramount's 10-Part The Godfather Series Is Better Than The Godfather Part III

Published Oct 3, 2026, 1:00 AM EDT

Cathal Gunning has been writing about movies, television, culture, and politics online and in print since 2017. He worked as a Senior Editor in Adbusters Media Foundation from 2018-2019 and wrote for WhatCulture in early 2020. He has been a Senior Features Writer for ScreenRant since 2020.

While The Godfather trilogy might be beloved as a whole, it is time to admit that Paramount’s raucous miniseries based on the behind-the-scenes story of the original movie is actually a superior follow-up to The Godfather Part III. The story behind The Godfather’s real-life horse head proves that the making of director Francis Ford Coppola’s mob epic was more than a little chaotic behind the camera.

While The Godfather trilogy is now viewed as a pivotal piece of movie history, the original movie’s murky financing and messy production process were infamous. As such, it wasn’t a shock when Paramount opted to base a dramedy miniseries on the movie’s making-of story back in 2022. What was shocking is the fact that the resulting 10-episode series is arguably a better end to the mafia saga than the infamously divisive The Godfather Part III.

Starring Miles Teller as The Godfather’s producer Albert S. Ruddy, 2022’s The Offer brings to life the wild story of The Godfather’s messy production. With an astounding ensemble cast including Juno Temple, Colin Hanks, Dan Fogler, Giovanni Ribisi, and Josh Zukerman, as well as guest roles for everyone from Michael Gandolfini to Brandon Sklenar, The Offer is as meandering and messy as the story it brings to life, but this is no bad thing.

The Offer's Audience RT Score Is More Accurate Than Its Critics Score

The Offer earned a brutal critical rating of 57% on Rotten Tomatoes, with reviewers complaining about the show’s many tangential subplots, the sprawling nature of its story, and its uneven tone. However, it is worth noting that The Offer also boasts an astounding 95% audience rating, one that can go toe to toe with the best gangster shows ever made, including Netflix’s Peaky Blinders, Guy Ritchie’s MobLand, Boardwalk Empire, or The Sopranos.

The gap between these ratings might seem extreme, but it makes more sense after a few years of hindsight. Critics didn’t have much time for The Offer’s blend of dark humor, nostalgia for ‘70s Hollywood, and occasional moments of tragic drama. However, audiences clearly enjoyed this tonal mélange, and the fact that The Godfather’s real-life production was such a messy and morally ambiguous affair lends this chaotic tone a sense of authenticity.

It is fair to say that The Godfather movies are never entirely clear on whether viewers should root for the Corleone family or not, something that becomes an issue in the more self-serious and dour The Godfather Part III. Thus, The Offer’s wonky mix of admiration and distaste for the real-life mob’s role in the movie’s creation feels both inconclusive and weirdly fitting, since it fits the ambitious morality of the franchise itself.

The Offer Feels Like A True Extension Of The Godfather Franchise

The Offer creator Michael Tolkin’s earlier 1988 novel The Player was turned into a movie of the same name in 1992, and this award-winning black comedy focused on an egotistical executive plagued by death threats from a screenwriter. The Offer feels like a chance for Tolkin to revisit this fertile creative territory, taking satirical aim at the business that provides him with his livelihood, while also underlining his own paradoxical love of Hollywood history.

Much like The Godfather movies never really decide whether they are enamored with the mob or disgusted by their crimes, The Offer leaves any moral judgments about the original movie’s production up to the viewer. For some critics, the show’s failure to outright embrace or condemn the mob’s alleged involvement made for a wishy-washy series with little to say.

However, for a lot of viewers, The Offer’s rambunctious slice of Hollywood history was fun precisely because the show didn’t get too bogged down in the ethics of movie making and financing. Instead, The Offer offers viewers a history of The Godfather that is just as morally murky as the movie itself, and it’s an offer audiences weren’t able to refuse.