MARE OF EASTTOWN and the Specter of Small-Town Murder Shows (Patreon)

A WOMAN WITH A FLASHLIGHT

Why is “small town murder” so compelling to watch?

Maybe it has to do with the viability of mystery as a TV genre on the whole? After all, we have a bevy of popular procedurals from your CSIs to your Law and Orders. Or maybe it’s the joy of watching brilliant detectives like your Sherlocks, Luthers, or Crackers outsmart the audience every week. Maybe it’s the joy of watching even detective-adjacent shows like House or The X-Files, all of which solve their “cases” to clap-inducing aplomb, or let those pesky cryptids fall through their fingers. But within the mystery genre, there are also all those brilliant limited series that tell a single-ish case within a season arc. Of which, The Prime Suspect series might be standard bearer (and maybe my favorite show ever). Or maybe you were all about the first season of True Detective. Or the wild, irreverent, and gutting approach of Jane Campion’s Top of the Lake. Or maybe you went international and adored the Scandanavian versions of The Killing and The Bridge. All these shows thrive on the week to week developments and water cooler-ism, as if we’re solving a case right alongside them. But there’s also something so compelling about the “small town murder” variation of these shows specifically.

Maybe it’s that takes that “enclosed space” nature of a murder manor mystery party or a killer on a train, the danger of something within the ranks of all those known associates. But what the small town setting is meant to do is bring the terror of the world to the sleepy town where “things like this don't happen.” The dynamic works so well in that first season of Broadchurch. Or it’s in the way that Catherine Cawood seemingly knows everyone in Happy Valley. And of course, there is the seminal, undisputed king of the genre: Twin Peaks, which took all these emotions to the most haunting, gorgeous, and abstract-laden heights. Small towns make such a good environment for television because they have all these pre-established personal dynamics. They’re characters with history and depth with one another and, because we live in a world that doesn’t talk too much, a lot of secrets that are ready to spill out. Even when you’re just watching these kinds of shows, they are more likely to reflect “your reality,” AKA the town you grew up in. Complete with messy houses and kids bedrooms and grassy streets and friendly / annoying neighbors and so much that feels almost too familiar... Along with so much that could seemingly destroy it. But this is the primal allure of this drama space.

On the other side of things, there is, of course, the moral question around cop shows in general. But perhaps it’s worth noting how much Detective Fiction intentionally tries to shy away from copaganda (either in a helpful or completely unhelpful way, sociologically speaking). For the leads in these shows rarely seem like “traditional police,” but more individuals deeply interested in the power of investigation, finding the ecstatic truth, and often deal with blue tape as much as outsiders do. But there’s the argument that all these tweaks just help put a false shine on the police as a whole and... I’m inclined to agree (I mean we’ve had way too much “policing as it should be!” narratives). But perhaps even more problematic is how much my brain can’t help but like them anyway.

Specifically how many of these compelling narratives feature attractive or semi-maternal cops who are out of the ordinary and navigating the ignorance of the boys clubs around. Like Helen Mirren striking through the toxic masculinity of her industry (and in that real 90’s way of girl-bossing so hard she helps hold up a corrupt institution?). Or the way Dana Scully rolled her eyes at everything before her, but always seeming to get knocked out right as the alien or werewolf could be seen. And here and now with Mare of Easttown, there’s a scene of Kate Winslet investigating a bullethole at night and I’m realizing how many of the shows we adore in this genre are about “a mom with a flashlight.” But hey there couldn’t be a more apt metaphor for investigation itself. And the horror of what we see when we look....

Mostly, we see that existence is fragile. That you can put up all the sunny fronts you want, things come into the small town and it seems like a terrifying, invasive prospect. But as we almost always learn, “the call is coming from inside the house.” In that it was likely a local crime by someone who knew the victim. My own home town was rocked by more than a few of these high-profile big crimes. It always felt surreal. As if they were these big, ugly, difficult stains that bring in reporters to talk to the people involved and turn lives into circuses. From people you know fairly well, to even people in passing. You feel it all so deeply… But if it is so scary, why does the narrativizing of this kind of murder compel us? Well, it’s the same reason so much true crime is resonant. It’s the “safe” way of facing that fear.

It’s the way of sorting out the chaos.

TACT AND ARCHITECTURE

There are so many people who approach writing structure like it’s something you apply in this broad way. But it’s not a fucking stencil you overlay onto any old story. There’s no foolproof “mystery format.” No, like all writing, it’s honoring the integrity of your choices and building a coherent narrative out from them. To best do that, I keep arguing that good storytelling is about best understanding “the timing of information.” For example, you have a main character, but you can’t just tell me EVERYTHING about their life up front. You have to make choices. Which means you have to really know who they are, how they behave, and convey the most important things about them up front in order to empathize. With them You have to give me the details that are relevant to best understanding the conflicts they are dealing with on page one. But soon, as things evolve, we get a more complete picture not just of who they are, but, more importantly, how they deal with things… and how they can change.

But this sense of “evolution” is more obvious with mystery storytelling, no? It’s also more counter-intuitive sometimes. Outside of the lead - a lot of times the characters being investigated who aren’t so much “having an arc” as they are slowly having the details be pulled out of them. I mean, the murderer was always the murderer. We simply find out later. So the real arc belongs to the audience and their understanding.

To execute a great mystery story, there has to be the same elements that make for ANY good story (compelling characters, a sense of propulsion, resonant themes, etc). There aren’t any special “rules” per say, more some guidelines, which can be broken if you have a good reason. But a pretty standard example is that if there is murder, you should probably already have met the character who secretly did the murder by pilots end (you can get away with later introductions, but it’s still something that has to be turned into with the set-up). But ultimately, you’re also aiming for a compelling surprise. The kind of surprise that makes your audience’s hair stand on edge, or perhaps feel some deep emotion, whether it is horror, sorrow, or even a feeling of shame. Why the best surprises / reveals tend to be the ones that were hiding right under your nose and when they happen, you go “oh, of course!” And please note that with some of the most shocking ones that may not make sense right in the moment, you only have a little time to explain the “why” afterward without letting all the air out. Essentially, you have to do enough set-up so that the pay-off works quickly. And it really has to make complete sense (even if you’re dealing in the more abstract like Twin Peaks, which is incredible), or else the audience will feel betrayed. Such is the end goal of mystery storytelling.

The real question is how you get there. Ideally, you make it entertaining and get to care about all these little stories along the main path of investigation, but there are two main pitfalls when it comes to the arc of mystery storytelling.

The first relying too heavily on constant surprise. It’s a balance thing. If you're constantly trying to upend the viewer, to hit them with constant shocks and twists and turns and cheap cliffhangers that purposefully leave them with lingering questions, then you’re going to wear them out too quickly. After all, there are so many shows that love to end on, “oh my god it's this guy!” and then you find out it’s not them, like, two seconds into the start of the next episode. You’re basically just tossing the audience around and being declaratory instead of letting the audience try to get ahead on their own. You can’t COMPLETELY be playing the game for them. At the same time, you can’t just make everything vague and awash in mysteriousness, either. Which means you have to lean in with a lot of traditional drama by building anticipation for certain events and actually understanding some truths for certain. As I said, it’s a balancing act, but a critical one to achieving the best results.

The second main pitfall is what hurts a lot of storytelling in general: a lack of clarity with intention with a given scene. Keep in mind that with mystery? The audience is paying extra attention, looking for clues and a real understanding of what people are trying to do. In that space, they are so sensitive to what feels wrong and right and why. As such, not only does the writing have to be on point. But the directing has to be in lockstep with it. Meaning you have to understand what characters are doing, what they are thinking, and why. That is ESPECIALLY true for the questions you are trying to raise in the audience (like, why did he just grab his phone? Oh is it to do X like we saw in Y before?). Fully knowing these  answers is the crucial nature of set-ups and payoffs, especially when trying to throw them off the scent. Because in the end, the hardest thing when it comes to pulling off the sleight of hand in mystery is answering this:

How do you get them to NOTICE details and not notice they noticed?

Because if you do that, you win.

WELL, DID THE HOAGIE MURDER SHOW WIN?

Warning: I’m going to dig pretty deep into the mechanics of Mare of Easttown, but I actually think it did a “pretty okay” job overall. That sounds like a much bigger slight than it is. Writing anything good is fucking hard. And I absolutely enjoyed the binge I just had with it.

Granted, it helps that it was driven by positively great actors. While I’ll talk about Mare’s characterization in a bit (it’s a big one), Winslet is always doing something interesting. She’s one of those actors you love to see make choices and can always internalize the hurt being thrown their way. What’s also great is how the show has an incredibly strong sense of setting. It’s not just the fun specificity of Philadelphia, it’s that utter feeling of the east coast suburb on the edge of the city. The way drugs are present, but not in the way it is in some other places. The way it’s populated by people who have stayed for decades and rarely left. There’s also this great sense of little detail. The vape pen is already the stuff of memes. But for me, it’s that her roots have grown out. It’s the hoagies still getting casually eaten after milk gets slammed throw the window. (Though some details are not without curiosity: are high school kids really still wearing Korn shirts?) Moreover, there’s an emotional grounded-ness to the show. It’s one of the things I’ve most enjoyed about writer / creator Brad Ingelsby’s work with producer Gavin O’Connor’s work. It’s got that even keeled sensibility. It's not trying to slide too far into pulp, nor will it overplay the more fantastical kinds of tension. It’s a show about our reality. And in that spirit, it absolutely checks the first box of what makes small town murder so engaging.

But the execution from there is a more interesting conversation that allows us to dig into some big questions of function (AKA what I always find the most interesting).

So when I watch shows I’m often noting all the times I’m getting “bumped.” Like when the show is firing on all cylinders and deeply engaging, everything feels like smooth sailing. But when there’s a hiccup, it bumps you. You simply notice a thing that’s feeling weird. Now, for a lot of people this is all about “staying in it” and losing yourself to the story on screen (which can really be the result of anything, from “boring non action scenes” to the slightest tonal variation). For me, I don’t really care about that. The movie can hop around and show me as much artifice as it wants. What I’m really paying attention to is the writing, but in a way where I’m always “doing the math,” right alongside it. (it’s sort of like counting cards. Yeah, you’re keeping track, but you’re not really thinking about it). Perhaps it’s better to say “writing alongside” it. And when I get bumped, yeah, sometimes it’s an artistic choice, sometimes even an edit or construction choice, but most of the time it goes right to the story level: why was the character doing x or y? What was the purpose of that scene? What do they want me to be feeling and thinking about that? Sure, sometimes, the divergent choices end up being part of a character set-up or change of behavior. But sometimes it’s just an errant bump. And when it comes down to the entirety of Mare of Easttown, I actually want to go through all of the arenas it offers.

TEXTURE - I think it’s kind of funny when my director friends get animated about another director’s random choice. I get it though, it’s their job. They have such a clear vision of how to construct a feeling within a given moment. With me, I tend to think there’s more than one way to skin a cat. But I was honestly surprised how often certain things in this show hit me. Specifically, did anyone else feel like music choices in some of the episodes were downright bonkers? You’d be going along with this sobering show, which would just sometimes come in with this “light and fresh” sounding score that’s just such a huge tonal juxtaposition. Keep in mind, t’s NOT that it’s juxtaposing with other scenes, but to what it’s seemingly even trying to establish in THESE scenes.

Meanwhile, a lot of the cinematography felt a bit like a catch 22. In one way, it felt completely unobtrusive, which I always love. But I kept noting how often it wasn’t really making a choice, either. Everything felt like a medium shot that’s always 45 degrees off to the side. I kept feeling desperate for a good close-up or an insert, or some sense of direction that purposefully was drawing my eye (which also showed how little motivated camera movement there was, too). I dunno, director Craig Zobel’s TV work has been interesting. People adore his “International Assassin” episode of The Leftovers (I’m less high on it), but I love his episode of Westworld. Perhaps it’s just that even all these years it’s STILL hard for me to shake my feelings about one of his features, that would be 2012’s Compliance; a film for which I have massive, deep existential problems with. But ultimately, there’s an evenness with Mare of Easttown, but also lack of specificity, which gets into some clarity issues I’ll get into later on.

LOGIC - Honestly, I’ll often overlook a lot of logical things if every other cylinder of a show is firing. But it’s a tell tale of a pressin logic issue, when it’s not something occurring later, but something that actively bumps you in the moment. And unfortunately, I found that I was constantly asking questions about it. Sometimes it was innocuous. Like, there’s things that often sound funny on the page, like “all six of us took a shit in his car” but then it’s like, wait all six of you had to take a shit all at once? I can’t shit on command, huh. But sometimes, it’s about actual scene construction. For instance, in the second episode Mare begins with interviewing Erin’s young boyfriend. From minute one, the entire interview SEEMS like she’s doing the classic baiting move where she asks a bunch of build up questions leading to the news of her death to test his acting skills and sees if he knows... but it’s already clear he knows? Like, it missed a crucial bit of clarity there to properly set up this scene.

Overall, this is kind of a big ongoing problem we have with Mare. With your investigator, you have to decide if the audience is going to be “behind” or “with” them as they approach their work. Sherlock is the classic example where the audience is behind and you’re catching up to their brilliance (and often why there is a Watson-like partner as the reader’s stand in). But if you’re with them, then you have to be in lock step with their approach to the investigation… but the Mare of Easttown can never make up it’s fucking mind on this count. And when we’re behind, there is no surrogacy. We just have to wait to get caught up. You just feel that subtle lack of control that infests a lot of things. Especially when reaching. Sometimes it’s moments where it’s like, “uh, a professor wants a student to fly out and visit campus? What?!” After showing a real understatement you’re suddenly gonna sensationalize the education system to manufacture steaks with the least dramatic part of this story? And sometimes, it plays into huge moments in the show that need believability. Like, in 2021 we’re supposed to believe she really went out and got that picture developed?

PROBLEMATIC TROPES - So this could easily be the biggest problem with the show because it ties into social import, but I can’t help but think of the way the show falls back on so many troubling modern stereotypes. Even a few years ago we were talking about the problem of the “Black woman therapist.” In case you’ve never heard of it, you might be wondering why it’s such a problem, but it’s honestly just a stones throw from the wise sage or “magical negro” tropes that came just before. Because, just like those characters, it’s someone whose only job is to make you, the white character, better with their support and wisdom. And notice that they absolutely don’t have lives or interiority of their own. The same can be said about the barely-registering subplot with their other friend whose name I think is Gayle)? Or the gay love interest who I know nothing about other than likes music and her daughter and literally doesn’t even express a feeling after the daughter’s ex sees them? Even the Black police chief reeks of the same instinct: the desire to “combat stereotypes” that basically go back to the 80’s and cater to dignified, respectability politics that do nothing but uphold the white status quo. I mean, nothing says being attune to the world of 2021 by signing up your Black male characters to be cops. Look, I know these kinds of characters exist in the real world. There are Black therapists and police chiefs, but you’re COMPLETELY missing the point if 1) you’re not really getting into their own interior existence and 2) only making these characters accessories to whiteness. I mean, fuck this is a show about “the reality” of Philadelphia that doesn’t even bring up the fact that it has one of the highest Black populations of east coast cities and yet Easttown has incredible segregation.  ALL of these choices add up. And sometimes it’s not about what you show us, but what you don’t.

CLIMACTIC FAKE OUTS - I’ve certainly seen shows do worse on the whole, but there were a few times I was worried. Like at the end of the second episode where Erin’s friend was like, “it was Frank Sheehan!” dun dun dunnnn as we see a malevolent shot of him in his backyard. There’s a few reasons this comes off wrong. Because you can introduce the audience to that moment of doubt, but we’re not gonna REALLY believe that her nice ex-husband is a possible muderer unless it creeps up much later in the narrative. Plus, it completely overplays the hand with the size of her reaction. It all reads heavily as being for “momentary effect.” The same goes for moment where Erin’s ex-boyfriend Dylan (and his mostly silent Black friend also with no iteriority) beat up and threaten Carrie with the gun, making it seem like they’re hiding the murder and there’s some nefarious secret? But in the end it was like… her idea to burn the journals? Why would the ex-bf want to do that? I honestly thought they were hiding like a drug ring or some shit, but worse - absolutely NONE of that came to have importance. And that’s the thing about the big fake outs. There has to be both a really good justification AND important fallout to the extreme nature of these actions. Without it, you undermine your narrative and turn it into a magnetball-like game of momentary effect. (note: we’ll save the final bait and switch with the son for end discussion).

CONSTRUCTION AND FLOW - So one of the hard things about doing a show with a giant ensemble cast (you know, like a small town murder shows) is not just keeping the audience abreast of who the characters are, but what the relationships are between all of them (and not just with the main character). It’s a hard thing to pull off, honestly, which just means being really diligent about never making assumptions that the audience will know what you know in your head. And so much depends on that seamless ability to make it clear through interaction without actually stopping the narrative flow. But with Mare of Easttown? I can’t tell you how many times I felt like I was stopping and going “oh, they’re friends?” or “oh, they’re related?” A lot of times I feel like we’d eventually get there with enough scenes, but it sort of represented just how often we were behind on the proverbial 8 ball with this show instead of in lockstep.

Some of that “being behind” has a point, of course. A lot of times they are inviting a sense of mystery about what a character is up to before hitting with the specific motivation (again, the show is competent enough to do some classic mystery stuff). But a lot of times the answer as to why a puzzling scene was happening was “just to make the audience feel a certain way when a later thing happens”. In one way, this is good set-up work. But it has to be more invisible than that. There HAS to be a reason that genuinely tracks within the scene itself, too.

Part of this ties into this basic “flow” issue with the overall story. For every really good scene, there’s so many scenes that start and stop without the “therefore / buts” I always talk about in so much in plotting. I constantly felt like I had no way “in” to what was starting on screen. Just as I rarely had much idea of how much time has passed. Or what her current objective was as she spent so much time on her heels. Even when it came to the way “the case took over her life,” all it meant was she looked at files in a scene or something. Whereas I never felt like I was getting a real sense of her workday, or how she juggled pressure and time commitments or money. We’d just suddenly cut to her personal life or things at home with her grandson and it seemed… fine? All the conflict was external with her grandson’s mom. And it’s less that you need to have really concrete reasons for doing these things, I actually felt like the problem was deeper to the core of the show’s characterization…

EMOTIONAL ARC - So when scenes jump around randomly on a “plot” level, the thing that needs to be crystal clear is the way a character is feeling. Like, say a character has their boss yell at them at work, they say nothing, come home, where someone says something nice to them and they yell back. It’s classic emotional displacement; a thing we can track from scene to scene even though there isn’t a “logical” connection. The logic rests in the psychological. But with Mare? So often these kinds of transitions are completely undressed. We’d go from the emotional whiplash of a really dark moment to her getting flowers and things just press on. And that’s the thing about her character. It’s not that she was stubborn, it’s that I could never actually track her thoughts. When it came to her navigating her life, I know she was dealing with A LOT, but I couldn’t ever really grasp the way she felt about them in so many scenes (which mostly comes from how much the show nestles her traumas deep into the narrative, always keen on delayed reveal over some very necessary bits of clarity). And most of all, there are so so so so many times I feel like we just missed or skipped over key emotional transition points that helped other characters change. Which finally brings us to talking about the show’s arcs on the whole.

Let’s go character by character.

GREAT GRANDMA JEAN SMART - Much has been made of the recent Jean Smart-aissance and deservingly so. She’s one of those actors who has been throwing 99mph for years now, in that she’s the kind of performer who has a naturally funny cadence and can tell jokes that others would make feel forced (like already classic “that was fucking stupid” line). Her presence is the kind of thing that lifts up so many damn scenes. But when it comes to her all-important final apology? I get the emotional sense of it. I get that it’s been a long time. I get that things have been hard. I get the texture of the change coming at the end of the investigation. But with writing we want to DRAMATIZE those exact kinds of changes. We really need to see the thing that clicks or happens that changes a relationship. But this, like so many other key moments, is muddled.

GUY PEARCE - I sort of feel like he’s a red herring in terms of casting alone? You see Guy Pearce, you think something has to be up eventually. In theory, I love the idea that he’s just playing a guy who likes her and wants to be with her. But what should work like another bait and switch falls flat because it’s the wrong way to come at that ending. I get that it’s supposed to be about Mare being okay with an unsure future, but fuck if that’s not just putting a hat on a hat. We’ve seen her navigate that all show. The thing she actually needs for her arc is to get comfortable with emotional intimacy (which the show seems at least aware of, but it sort of fumbles that idea with her needless confession about Evan Peters). It’s not that this prospective ending would be “nicer.” It’s that it’s the more emotionally interesting way to approach what she’s been dealing with. Without it, the entire storyline limps to nothing.

ERIN’S ASSHOLE BOYFRIEND - When I was watching this show I constantly felt like the kid alternated between malevolent jerk and “kinda sensitive under all that, I guess.” But like the grandma moment, it was not for any real psychological reason. It was simply because the narrative needed him to be one or the other in the moment. Like in the end, I know *that* he seemed to change, but I don’t get what changed in him and why. I really don’t. Just being in the presence of the baby? Getting shot which he never talks about? Like seriously, that dude seemed to recover from a gunshot pretty fucking quick.

HIS ASSHOLE GIRLFRIEND  - This change made even less sense. She was portrayed like the least self-aware devil incarnate and then “I’m just trying to do the right thing for Erin and for that baby.” Again, this is the thing about the “structure” of writing. You can get that people grow and change, you can get to resolution - but you HAVE to find the moments that dramatize it otherwise it rings hollow and unearned. Also, did anyone else notice how much her accent dropped in the back half?

ERIN’S DAD - I honestly think he’s the most psychologically well-articulated character in the show? It’s sort of a testament to the power of keeping things simple and really clear. But where his initial mac and cheese scolding / scalding scene may seem hard - there’s a lot of nuance to the scene where he finds out she died, specifically the way he can’t process grief without it quickly turning to rage and acting out. But like a lot about the ending, there needed to be more of how he processed the reality of what REALLY happened to her... but it’s just not there.

DAWN W/ CANCER AND MISSING DAUGHTER - Of all the arcs and relationships with Mare, I feel like this one has the best foundation and ends up feeling the most satisfying. It’s not just because the rescue scene at the end of episode five is harrowing (and executed pretty fantastically, endless props to them), it’s because we have so much of a sense of the hurt and character dynamics right from the start of episode one. Thus it feels like it really pays off (even if I still wanted ONE (1) actual scene of dramatization of Dawn and her daughter now at home with something that actually shows that dynamic range. Also, it can actually set up the pay off of them getting all those nice new things (without it, it’s just a nice thing that happens).

CREEPY PRIEST - “I hope they treat you better than we did.” Nope, fuck off. That line made my skin crawl (again, person from Boston Irish Catholicism here). Not only was there still the lack of clarity about the reason he had to move in the first place, but his relationship with Erin honestly seemed suspect too. I honestly can’t imagine telling THIS version of the story in 2021. And the idea that this character is the one who gives that giant speech where he says the moral about forgiveness (which doesn’t actually apply to so many of the stories this show told) drove me up the wall. This was totally bungled. Also, you really can’t have an entire town show up for church in the finale if you’ve never shown them all going to church before.

GORDON CLAPP - You probably don’t know who that is, but he was the dad of the two odlder brothers at the end - and he’s a really great character actor who I really miss seeing! But I’m noting him because he’s a perfect example of a big lynchpin character who only shows up for an important scene and then disappears. It sounds silly, but in writing it’s really the kind of thing you’re taught to avoid.

MARE’S DAUGHTER - One of the tell tale signs about a character not working is that you keep writing more for them, hoping you’ll eventually strike pay dirt. I really like this actress, but there’s sooooo much time spent with Mare’s daughter, her love life, her wants, and needs. And again, it’s nice! But all of it is entirely demonstrative. It’s showing us what exists, but… I don’t know what it’s really about, especially when it comes to its relevance to this particular show. Like, I could frame some ideas about breaking cycles and getting away, but they feel like little touches of things instead of the core conflict, especially between her and her mom. I mean, did her Mere ever actually want to make her stay here? Did the daughter actually articulate the reasons she wanted to stay? There’s no actual conflict that builds into the moment where Mere tells her to “go to Berkeley” so it doesn’t feel like the conclusion to a story. Especially when the only real conflict along the way AKA when she takes drugs and yells “it should have been you!” is weird as hell and never gets a conclusion either. They DON’T end up talking about it. So I look at all of this and it's one of those things where if I was giving notes I’d be like “pick what you want to do here and turn into it.”

EVAN PETERS GO BYE BYE - So I spent five damn episodes being like, what is this character’s deal? He’s just on his heels and deferring and we get these little bits and pieces that feel so damn weird. Then it finally leads up to the reveal that he didn’t actually solve the last case (and thus feels like a kid imposter who understandably gravitates towards Mare’s competency). I was like, oh, this makes so much sense! It’s actually a really neat idea that re-frames so much of what we see. But like a lot in this show, it holds onto it a bit too late. I think you can get a few episodes of not knowing, but five episodes is A LOT to be in the dark with him. Especially when it gets thrown into a really tone-deaf kiss, followed by a scene of him getting shot right in the head. Now, for the latter - as a moment in and of itself? It’s shocking. Powerful. Heartbreaking. But honestly, it would hit harder if we had more space between the scenes. Imagine it coming with a sense of real growth and high of competency going in instead of the high of confession. But that’s not the only problem with the shooting.

Going in I’m constantly asking, “why are we spending so much time with his mom?” The scenes would not only work better if we knew he didn’t solve the case, but the truth is they mostly ONLY exist so that when he dies, there’s someone there to yell at Mare. I hate being that reductive about it, but you can just see it in the writing itself (and it’s emblematic of all the kinds of post-script answers the narrative gives us). Even the scene itself where his Mom slaps Mare is uncomplicated and easy. Like, that’s the absolute most obvious way to come at that particular scene. The first thing you’re taught in writing is to find the way to “say it without saying it,” which often creates a far more devastating effect. Moreover, the lesson being articulated about Mere thinking she can “go through life with no consequences” is absolutely NOT the way to put that issue. Because she’s talking to someone whose life IS nothing but consequences (also the idea that this triggers her one moment of vulnerability after feels SO wrong). And the real reason it all feels so hollow (and in the end, about sympathy inducing for Mare) is because the narrative never brings it, nor Evan Peters character up again. I think this is a criminal writing offense. He was her partner for five episodes. I cannot overstate how much this underscores how much everything about him ended up being a prop for a momentary effect. And more importantly...

How it helps reveal something deeply wrong with Mare’s characterization.

THE MARE PROBLEM - So are we going to talk about the fact that, as unintentionally-written, Mare is kind of a sociopath? That may sound harsh and it’s honestly more the way the show deals with emotional arcs that makes it feel more sociopathic and she just happens to be in most of the scenes. Either way, it’s absolutely the thing I can’t get out of my mind and I have to try and explain.

On paper, I get what Mare’s dealing with as a character. The trauma of multiple loss. The shitty responsibility of always having to be “the heavy.” How much she’s always putting everything on her shoulders and having to make tough decisions. The idea is that all this closed her off and hardened her. She’s now the hard nosed cop, the one who wasn’t ever easy for people to deal with (we know this because they tell her that 1000 times). But.. as actually dramatized? It’s not really the sense at all we get as an audience. Everyone keeps saying “I hate you for X and Y” but, like, we never saw evidence of those things being dramatized? Especially in the family? And even in so much of her police work we see sensitivity in dealing with so many situations softly and with tact. And it’s that same sensitivity when she’s with her grandson. And if the show is trying to articulate that “that’s where she’s a functional person,” then you need to underline it and have other characters call out the conflict.

We should be understanding the repression and displacement that’s happening, but there’s SO many moments where I can’t track her behavior. I didn’t understand her entertaining the date with Evan Peters, eventually it seems to be that it was “to stay close to the case,” but the way she even talks about it after doesn’t read like that at all. It’s so muddled. As is the way the narrative plays coy about her past damage while often ignoring the damage she’s doing now in the moment. Keep in mind, the show doesn’t need to moralize Mare, nor does she have to be aware of her own pathological behavior - it’s the WRITING and the show has to be aware. For example, I’ve been re-watching The Sopranos lately and it’s just masterful at this. After all, it’s a show about gangsters who are constantly compartmentalizing and displacing their confused psychologies. It works because they’ll stamp these moments with sequencing. For instance, we will see the hippyish Janice tell Tony and Carmela to go easy on punishing their daughter, but when Janice realizes their daughter trashed HER prospective house, suddenly she goes apeshit - which paints a perfect picture of her myopic selfishness. And as a piece of drama, you can track it in a quick three steps within the story. This is the backbone of storytelling with emotional arcs… but there’s so many ways that Mare always feels jumbled.

Most of the time it’s not some big thing, but these little interactions that add up to the death of 1000 paper cuts. But every once and a while there’s a big moment that is indicative of all of it. Like the absolute BATSHIT move to have Mare put the coke in her daughter law’s car to frame her. I genuinely can’t believe that they put us, the audience, behind the 8 ball on that particular move. Because that’s the kind of horrible decision you have to build the main character up to. We have to be WITH them. We have to see the pressure to accelerate and watch as they start making the bad move and we understand her intention so you go “no no no!” But instead it completely blindsides us with something that not only is egregious - but has way, way, way, way less consequences than it should have. I mean, fuck. This is a truly horrific piece of police abuse. And everything about the casual execution of this move reflects the recklessness of the narrative. And, to me, goes further to showcase the lack of understanding of what they’re trying to say with this character and how to frame her story.

Let’s put it like this: how is the opening scene of Mare discovering her son in the attic not the opening of the show? Or at least a culmination of the pilot, possibly in tandem with Erin? Think about it. If you’re ending the story on her finally going back into the attic, this really has to be where you start. Because it not only bookends things, it frames so much of what her character is specifically dealing with (even on the logic point, they keep saying she lost her son “recently” but we get no idea how that figures into the timeline as present). Like, how do you not even fix that in the edit? Part of it is what I said before, the show’s constant desire to “hold on too long” to certain information and treat things as reveals when they are actually story-critical set-ups. Like I said, it’s all about timing of information. But the show kept trying to back door everything, including so much about the ending itself.

Which finally brings us to the biggest problem…

MARE’S BEST FRIEND AND HER SON - So.. this is the show. Or what is supposed to be the show. Make no bones about it. The story of your killer? And the way what the killer does relates to the main characters? Not only in terms of relationships, but specifically the way it reflects on what they’re supposed to be dealing with internally? This is mystery 101. This is ALWAYS what your show is really about. And as a writer, you have to understand this. You have to.

But like so much about Mare of Easttown, I get the sense that they are aware of this narrative need, but their ways of dealing with this are mostly textural. Which is why Mare’s best friend Lori (played by the incredible Julianne Nicholson) is simply… around a lot? I mean, they have conversations. We see Mare be nice to Lori’s kids. She asks Lori questions. They basically serve as each other’s respites. And thankfully, when we finally get to it in later episodes, there’s the bait and switch that deals with Lori’s son talking about the affair (but really it’s part of the murder cover-up). And when the big reveal finally comes? The well-executed texture of the heartache and sadness is fully there. For there are few things more touching than the reluctance of such a moment... But like a lot of storytelling in this show, we have a few problems around it.

The first is the set-up in that you need a more personal “bait and switch” story around Mare’s interest in their lives, particularly when it comes to Lori’s son. Like, this all needs to be devastatingly personal for her, too. Going back to those guidelines I mentioned at the top, “a pretty standard example is there is murder, you should probably already have met the character who secretly did the murder by pilots end.” And while I remember Lori, I honestly don’t think her son even really registered with me until episode five? Like, again, these aren’t hard and fast rules, but it indicates this feeling about the lack of set up with character that I honestly don’t have a great sense of. Hell, even when his sister gets picked on in school, I had forgotten that was his sister. These things are important.

The second, and perhaps far more devastating, is that it spends absolutely ZERO time on the complexity of Mare’s decision. Like, just moments earlier this was a woman who was willing to break all the rules and plant drugs on her daughter in law and like… not reporting this isn’t even a thought? She’s not going to wrestle with it? I’d even go so far to say the ending is far more compelling if she DOESN’T pursue it (and could even tie into the arc stuff better). But at least fucking give it a thought? Like it’s not really a spoiler, but one of the things I love about Gone Baby Gone is how much the moral complexity of choice plays into an ending that is just as fraught. But here, it’s yet another huge transition point that’s completely skipped over. We see Mare be so distraught watching the video and go straight to, well, we’re arresting my friend’s kid I guess! They make the choice to put the audience behind the 8 ball YET AGAIN instead of being inside her head.

But then there’s the third and last thing, which is sort of the one that actually bothers me the most… So this is all *really* about leading to the ending where Mare goes over and Lori cries and she hugs her. To paint a bigger underline on it, this happens after Mare listens to the Priest’s insane speech where he says “don’t let them” stop you, so Mare goes over to Lori’s house, outright ignoring boundaries and her wishes, doesn’t even apologize and in the end… It even seems like Mare is the one that Lori and the narrative is forgiving with this action? Because time had passed or something?

It’s not only a horrific understanding of boundaries, it’s so emblematic of what the show always  skips, just as it is it is emblematic of the sociopathic way that Mare myopically goes through life- but in a way where the show never seems to quite grasp when it’s actually doing that. The show has such a strange relationship to how it punishes / rewards its character with this real guilt laden crap. After all, so much of the last two episodes is about all these other characters apologizing to Mare and her NEVER doing the same. I feel like there’s this horrific push-pull in the way that other characters matter / don’t matter to her / should be more grateful. Moreover, I don’t know what her character learned from fucking any of this?

Which brings us to the ending observation…

A QUESTION OF IMPACT

There’s a funny tweet I saw about how Mare of Easttown was really about “the most cursed basketball team” (I’ve been looking everywhere and can’t find it cause twitter’s search function sucks, if you can, please note below) and here’s the thing… I think there’s a few telling reasons why that instantly reads as a joke. The first is because it feels true when you look at the fates of the characters. The second is because that opening basketball stuff ends up having little to no other relevance beyond the nice texture it provides. And the third is because it invites us to imagine a show that sees that characterization so much more completely. But instead, we get a show that inadvertently backdoors into that unfortunate reality.

For whatever it’s worth, Mare of Easttown is such an interesting show in that it feels like the kind of story that has all of the pieces, but it’s not quite put together right. And when it comes to fixing that, there’s part of me that looks over Mare of Easttown is honestly just “a draft away,” in that you move some pieces around, bring a few bits of information to beginning, and change the characterization of a few ending beats and have something that really snaps into focus better. At least dramatically. But there’s also a part of me that has to sort of go to the deep DNA of the show and wonder what’s really going on behind this.

Because I have no idea what this show is saying.

I know what this show is about. It’s touching on all the subjects listed at the start of this essay on small town murder shows. It’s about how existence is fragile and we should be afraid of our terrible sons and for our vulnerable daughters and that all folks are deserving of mercy. It’s real Catholic fire and brimstone shit. But rather than hitting any of this with any real transcendence or even understanding, it actually becomes emblematic of those same problems (particularly that “don’t let them” crap). It honestly just showcases a weird conservative streak right alongside it. There’s so many moments where I’m like “you absolutely don’t have to take that fucking baby.” Or when a drug addict is like, “tell ‘em I’m sick” and I’m like you ARE sick, tho, don’t you understand? And most of all how much it isn’t actually properly dealing with the healing of cycles and abuse, but instead the same propagations. So many of the decisions in the show come across like, “well, we fucked up with my first son, let me take on a new baby son!” But like doesn’t track or stamp that with any kind of insight, let alone a transformative one. Sure, we get all these scenes about texture and self-forgiveness and the final attic shot, but I HONESTLY don’t know what she specifically learned that got her to do that. As much as I feel for the characters themselves, I don’t know what to feel about the rest of it. And I can’t help but wonder about what the “heart” of the show really is.

For example, there’s this one scene I can’t get out of my mind.

It’s where Mare, her mother, and her daughter are all sitting around the kitchen table and she makes the confession about the drug placement and I’m watching the three of them interact and I’m like… how is this not the show? Like how are these sudden three-way dynamics, which are so critical and telling and a beautiful way of coming at THIS story in THIS town, not at the center of just about everything we’re encountering? But perhaps that lack is on par for a show that never quite formed a coherent point of view, nor truly wrestled with all the things it told us it was wrestling with, nor could even pinpoint what it was exactly after.

Case in point: the finale was titled “Sacrament,” which I think was mostly just a vague allusion to the final mass scene and the notion of forgiveness. But in Catholicism? The term could actually mean any of seven ceremonies: baptism, confirmation, eucharist, penance, anointing of the sick, marriage, and holy orders. There’s this part of me that wants to play with that idea. To dig in deep with the themes like I so love to do and try to find the ways the show had different versions of these same sacraments through it’s seven episode run. But every time I try? I end up stretching and breaking the cardinal rules of semiotics which have the need for direct coherency. And this inability to make those symbols sparkle with metaphorical clarity reflects so much about how I feel about the show. It’s something that gets halfway there. Enough so that I genuinely enjoy and prod into it. But not enough that it resonates on like a powerful echo or with the diamond bullet to the brain. There’s so much good on the surface texture of the thing, but not the architecture of the thing. And to truly harness the narrative power small town murder…

You need both.

<3HULK