Christian Harder

This is a tremendous satire. It plays on the sub-genre of “suburban-intrigue” that has become a staple of dramatic filmic fiction (a là “Girl On the Train”, “Big Little Lies”). Almost every line is satiric. As some have noticed, some are laugh-out-loud funny (e.g, I can comfortably say that, until now, I’d never found the premise of a young girl’s murder laugh-out-loud funny). To be fair, 90% of the comedy falls squarely in the realm of dry satire, playing on the campy, overwrought melodramas that define heady “housewife” dramas of aughts. I guess it’s only made funnier by the fact that its decidedly dry style and lack of slapstick humor has confused almost every other review I’ve read. I can’t imagine watching this and taking it seriously (especially knowing Bell’s hallmark style), but it’s a pretty big hint that almost all of the cast have backgrounds in comedy. Business Insider and CNN have decent, clear-eyed reviews of the show if you don’t want to take my word for it. If you want to take it as serious drama, then go for it, but it might help to watch knowing that it’s decidedly in the realm of comedy and that it’s ok to laugh. Let’s loosen up! Not everything has to be straight-down-the-line unambiguously genre-bound.