![]() ![]() At the end everyone is broken (even the beautiful seaside resort itself, which is said to be going to be submerged under water in ten years' time) except possibly Danny's (one of the brothers) son Nolan, who might just possibly have found a way out of the family curse.ĭo not watch if you want to be entertained, but as anti-thriller or anti-family drama it's quite absorbing. ![]() OK, it's a technique for creating suspense, but it's overused here and grates for that reason.Īlthough there are some loopholes in the plot (for example, why is Sally allowed to tell her story from the past during the court hearing when the judge had previously ruled that the defence lawyer should not be allowed to bring in any extraneous material?) but on the whole the plot is meticulously constructed and the characters of the family members convincingly drawn.Īs I said, a Greek tragedy set in Florida Keys and dragged out depressingly long with no satisfying conclusion at all (what the ancients called catharsis). The script writer loves the technique of breaking off a dialogue or scene just when something important is about to be said or revealed, leaving the story hanging in the air. Danny, by the way, is one of the more engaging characters in the first series: but he's truly maddening as well, a real prodigal son returning and *not* making good. The crimes which follow on from that result from the fact that one of the brothers, Danny, goes to the bad when his father punishes him violently for the drowning of the sister. It's not revealing too much to say that the 'original crime' which sets the whole thing off is the accidental drowning of one of Sally's children and the consequences of that. Here the opposite happens: a well-regarded, successful family grinds itself into the dust. This is psychologically very tiring for the viewer, although it may be more realistic than standard crime dramas which routinely come to a resolution with the triumph of good over evil. In other words, nobody takes his confession seriously and there is no resolution to the plot at all.Īs I said, all thirty-odd episodes over three seasons are unrelentingly grim: there's not a laugh in the whole show, merely a grinding feeling of tension and frustration that the truth never comes out and the lies persist. At the very end when the 'baddy' finally decides to end the saga by confessing to his guilt, the policeman colleague to whom he confesses merely pats him on the shoulder and says: people who have become paranoiac do not realize it themselves, but others around them do. ![]() Rather, there is a court scene, but a (relatively) innocent man is sentenced to 30 years in prison, and the real killer is never identified. ![]() There is no resolution to the plot in a thrilling court scene or police chase or anything similar. The baddies become goodies in that they are unjustly punished/killed. I'd say the whole thing is a kind of anti-thriller. At one point the mother of the family in this series, Sally, says she thinks the family is cursed. Agamemnon) back to an original crime or murder and shows the family curse working itself out over the generations. I think the writer of this 3-season drama must know Greek tragedy, which also traces family tragedy (e.g. Unremittingly grim family drama/thriller set in beautiful Florida Keys. ![]()
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