Starring:
Jennifer Garner, Angourie Rice, Aisha Tyler, Augusto Aguilera, and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau.
“The series follows Hannah Hall, who forms an unexpected relationship with her stepdaughter as she searches for her husband who recently disappeared.” – From Wiki
For some reason, Jennifer Garner is one of those actresses that always seems to draw me in. Even when I do not watch the movie or show she is in, I am usually aware of it. This one though hit some of my hardcore loves, which is Jennifer and a mystery involved! I kept seeing it marketed towards me through social media. I was like, “what is this even about” which is always how I get started on these journeys with shows. This slight push towards the show was helped by the fact that it was not a 22 episode series, but only 7 episodes.
Hannah loves her husband. She believes in him, until she discovers that everything she knows is a lie. He disappears and no one knows where he is, including the step-daughter he leaves behind.
As someone that enjoys a LOT (I mean a LOT) of mystery type shows and have watched a lot of them, this was a slow-burner due to this. When I first started I had one perception of what my overall experience was going to be. I felt that this was not going to be a fun watch for me, but decided that due to it only being 7 episodes that I would complete it. This perception continued to evolve and change as I kept getting further into the mystery and it started to unravel. The reason it changed towards the positive: Jennifer Garner. Also understanding that while I went into it for the mystery element, I was with a more powerful message about family. The choice of who we decide to accept as our family, even without blood ties.
Jennifer Garner, as I mentioned, always draws me in. I was worried though as she has done a lot of family type films in the last several years of her career and had not seen her engaging in material that would be deeper. This was apparent in some of the moments of this show, as she was a bit flat in some scenes. These were largely within the context of the romantic moments though. She was able to play the intense moments and more importantly the emotionally depth moments that were needed for the “Hannah” character. She was the obvious star of this vehicle, but I will say that Angourie Rice did a phenomenal job as “Bailey”, the step-daughter. She encapsulated the confusion of a child learning that everything about their life was a lie beautifully and masterfully of a more seasoned actor, like Garner. There scenes in the later episodes were sheer great television. They knew how to play off each other and create the necessary emotional moments that were needed for where their characters were in the overall narrative.
There were moments that I did feel like I wanted to roll my eyes though in terms of the writing. I could tell that it was the writing and not a choice of the actors when certain things did not make logical sense in a modern day world. For example, it took Hannah way too long to actually look to see if something had happened with her husband’s legitimate work. It was weird to see some of those weird story choices. I did like the nod though to how old newspapers could be kept at a library and that felt authentic, since I remember these from my own local library. They would not have been as readily available online. While the writing felt weird during some of the mystery moments of the show, I will say that I started to enjoy the show when I started to realize that it wasn’t just about the mystery. By the end I recognized that it was also about Hannah’s journey towards motherhood. Her becoming more than what she thought she could be to “Bailey”. This was what kept me able to watch all the 7 episodes during lull moments.
If you are looking for a simplistic story that involves a mystery, you will find this one to be enjoyable. It is not a stunner or anything new or innovative in the mystery field, but sometimes when we are watching a mystery show we don’t need those elements. Sometimes we need old familiarity. This felt like that. It felt like going into a typical mystery type and knowing what was coming then getting a bit of a nice, refreshing blanket with the other elements of the narrative.
This is based on a book:
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