I tried really hard to get into this. The BBC has been giving it the big push as the must-watch mystery programme of the year but I have to say I really didn't get it.
The story has echoes of "Twin Peaks" meets "Rebecca" as Chloe, a glamorous society hostess, who apparently had it all, seemingly commits suicide. Married to a handsome, well-connected husband, they live in a massive house in the country and move amongst the elite with their beautiful, successful friends. So just why did she jump to her death in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere and why also was the last person she called before she ended it all her childhood best friend who she dropped years before?
Over six hour-long episodes we then watch that ex-schoolfriend Becky, whose life hasn't gone as smoothly as her ex-friend's, deliberately parachute herself into Chloe's world to try and unravel the twin mysteries of how exactly she died and just why she chose to reach out to her at the end.
Becky then resolves to gatecrash Chloe's set to find the answers but to do this she has to reinvent herself. In reality, she's a rather insignificant office temp with no outstanding skills. She drives a beaten-up old car, doesn't dress up particularly fancy or go out much, instead spending most of her time looking after and trying to care for her mother who has episodes of dementia. Becky has a guilt complex of her own, blaming herself for the death of her baby sister when she herself was a child after her mother left them unattended in their bath, an event the latter has never gotten over and for which she seems to still blame the now adult Becky.
So Becky adopts the name of her dead sister, Sasha, glams herself up and with a mixture of opportunism and sheer chutzpah, breaks into Chloe's inner-circle, becoming P. A. and best friend to Chloe's best friend and more significantly sleeping with and moving in with her widower husband.
Now, how she does all this is quite watchable as she contrives her elaborate con and for long enough I was intrigued as to how Chloe's last moments would eventually be explained, especially as we see them teased out in Becky's tortured dreams with each slightly longer, slightly different dream seemingly drawing her closer to the truth as she processes more information from her encounters with those around Chloe.
There are many cliff-hanging moments but the effect of these is dissipated through sheer repetition. Besides Chloe's recurring reappearances, just how many times can Becky get up in the middle of the night and somehow not disturb the sleeping ex-husband she's now living with to search the house or go through his things?
I found the conclusion ultimately confusing and unsatisfying and after sitting through all that had preceded it, was left feeling rather flat and let down. I found I didn't feel enough empathy never mind sympathy for Becky's beggar-at-the-feast character and rather wished she'd instead come up with some big revenge plan on all of Chloe's chums but it became all about Becky herself and how she somehow finds herself after pursuing this crazy, cock-eyed odyssey of self-discovery.
I see that Erin Richards has been garnering rave reviews as Becky but she never really won me over to her side with her sometimes callous manipulation of people who she sees as getting in her way. I wasn't especially struck either with any of the performances in support.
Dragged out and built up, I'm afraid this just turned out to be one big letdown for me.
The story has echoes of "Twin Peaks" meets "Rebecca" as Chloe, a glamorous society hostess, who apparently had it all, seemingly commits suicide. Married to a handsome, well-connected husband, they live in a massive house in the country and move amongst the elite with their beautiful, successful friends. So just why did she jump to her death in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere and why also was the last person she called before she ended it all her childhood best friend who she dropped years before?
Over six hour-long episodes we then watch that ex-schoolfriend Becky, whose life hasn't gone as smoothly as her ex-friend's, deliberately parachute herself into Chloe's world to try and unravel the twin mysteries of how exactly she died and just why she chose to reach out to her at the end.
Becky then resolves to gatecrash Chloe's set to find the answers but to do this she has to reinvent herself. In reality, she's a rather insignificant office temp with no outstanding skills. She drives a beaten-up old car, doesn't dress up particularly fancy or go out much, instead spending most of her time looking after and trying to care for her mother who has episodes of dementia. Becky has a guilt complex of her own, blaming herself for the death of her baby sister when she herself was a child after her mother left them unattended in their bath, an event the latter has never gotten over and for which she seems to still blame the now adult Becky.
So Becky adopts the name of her dead sister, Sasha, glams herself up and with a mixture of opportunism and sheer chutzpah, breaks into Chloe's inner-circle, becoming P. A. and best friend to Chloe's best friend and more significantly sleeping with and moving in with her widower husband.
Now, how she does all this is quite watchable as she contrives her elaborate con and for long enough I was intrigued as to how Chloe's last moments would eventually be explained, especially as we see them teased out in Becky's tortured dreams with each slightly longer, slightly different dream seemingly drawing her closer to the truth as she processes more information from her encounters with those around Chloe.
There are many cliff-hanging moments but the effect of these is dissipated through sheer repetition. Besides Chloe's recurring reappearances, just how many times can Becky get up in the middle of the night and somehow not disturb the sleeping ex-husband she's now living with to search the house or go through his things?
I found the conclusion ultimately confusing and unsatisfying and after sitting through all that had preceded it, was left feeling rather flat and let down. I found I didn't feel enough empathy never mind sympathy for Becky's beggar-at-the-feast character and rather wished she'd instead come up with some big revenge plan on all of Chloe's chums but it became all about Becky herself and how she somehow finds herself after pursuing this crazy, cock-eyed odyssey of self-discovery.
I see that Erin Richards has been garnering rave reviews as Becky but she never really won me over to her side with her sometimes callous manipulation of people who she sees as getting in her way. I wasn't especially struck either with any of the performances in support.
Dragged out and built up, I'm afraid this just turned out to be one big letdown for me.