Tom Smith

The central idea has potential but the massive plot holes, unbelievable motivations and bad dialogue of the middle 2-4 episodes ruin it. It just gets more and more stupid and hard to take seriously as it goes on. The finale could have been great if they had stuck to it but it doesn't get the setup it deserves and so in the end, the twists just seem quite boring and inconsequential. Bad story aside, I could have got into it if any of it was the least bit scary or any of the characters were intimidating. The worst culprit was the laughably bad river scene, that 'cult' looked like they had been asked to play pirates on a children's TV show. Nothing intimidating or menacing about them at all. They must have already used up their budget on gas masks, snake wranglers and the ever-present moody, blue lighting in the police station scenes. That brings me onto the unbelievable actions some of the characters do, they just don't make sense. Why would the main cop's boss, who has just suspended him for harassing his neighbour, give him the name of the prison his neighbour was in? Shouldn't she be trying to stop him going after his neighbour? She's just helping him on his crusade that she has already written him up for. Why did the man in the cabin care so much about whose dog it was? He had just said he doesn't talk to cops and a cop has offered him anything he wants, as long as he helps him in return...and the man doesn't ask him to find anything out about his missing daughter? He instead is really invested in a random dog that appeared on his doorstep? Those are just two of the many giant holes that made the whole watch a tough sell. So many characters do things that make no sense, just because the writers are trying to drag the plot along. The only saving grace is the interaction between the two cops in the early episodes. I would have loved to have seen that dynamic play out a bit more before the 'reveal', which was visible from a mile of. Great potential but ruined by the writers not committing, falling into easy tropes and having an unfortunate attachment to plot holes and absurd leaps of faith.