Fall River

Unlike a lot of recent crime docuseries, “Fall River” never drags because Day keeps the pace humming through the various different theories about these cases. ... But then “Fall River” was derailed by COVID. Jailhouse interviews with people like Drew and Murphy were put on hold and the project lost some of its thrust.

“Fall River” is telling a sad story and a fairly old one, in which the principals no longer have much to fear, or much at stake, with the exception of Drew, who is interviewed in a Massachusetts prison. ... All the same, the setting of eastern Massachusetts—with its history of damnation-spewing preachers, Salem witch trials, Melville’s haunted whalers and, yes, Lizzie Borden—provides something of a welcoming atmosphere for imaginary demons, and very real murder.

The abruptness of Fall River’s ending goes hand-in-hand with a formal approach that’s conventional at best and rickety at worst, undermined by cheesy chapter headings featuring scary devil-ish book illustrations. Nonetheless, as a mystery marked by inextricably knotted-up untruths, it’s a non-fiction work that’s been well-designed to spark heated debate and incite further inquiry—as well as, perhaps, beget a sequel.