The original post: /r/television by /u/boredapril on 2024-08-05 06:24:51.

I just want to preface this by saying that I absolutely adored this show. I was hooked from the get-go. The acting was top notch, the script was brilliant, and as someone who had no knowledge of the novel or movie, I was left stumped as to who killed Carolyn the entire season.

The 2 biggest issues:

  1. The idea that upon finding Carolyn’s body, Rusty assumed without ANY evidence that his wife killed Carolyn is nonsensical. They really expect me to believe that Rusty, a PROSECUTOR, would suspect his wife, who

A. to his knowledge did not know the affair was ongoing B. had no history of violence whatsoever

Of killing Carolyn, is bad writing. It’s simple as that. He was so convinced that his wife killed Carolyn that he decided to be an accessory to murder that night.

Another big hole in this assumption is that Rusty knew that Reynolds had threatened Carolyn when he was found guilty. He KNEW that Carolyn, being someone who has put many people behind bars, had enemies. The fact that he came to the conclusion that his wife was 100% guilty that night makes no logical sense.

  1. The daughter killing Carolyn is ridiculous. This just screamed “we have to make this unpredictable”. It’s fine if you want to ensure viewers are surprised but you have to make it make sense. A teenage girl from a well-adjusted family who has no history of mental illness or violence just snapped and bludgeoned a pregnant prosecutor to death. But it’s fine guys she’s actually completely normal and just “disssociated” that night, nothing to see here!

I’m assuming the writers fell in love with the convenience of disassociation because it was the perfect way to escape the fact that in any real life scenario this would never happen. I’m not saying teenage girls haven’t killed before, but absolutely nothing we learned about the daughter throughout the series would even remotely suggest she would do this.

I still love the show and it was super entertaining to watch it over the weekend but holy shit they should have just made Rusty the killer or his wife. This was so poorly executed