Jumpingfrog

Season 1: Starts out intriguing, creates an interesting enigma, but gradually collapses under the characters’ strange and irrational behavior, and several plot holes. The last two episodes are told With a lot of too drawn-out scenes which makes you want to fast-forward since it is obvious what is going to happen.

This review is based only on the first two episodes. The first impression was that this series is somewhat falsely advertised. The trailer signaled a dark, gritty, tense thriller, but the feel of the two first episodes - at least the first 1 1/2 - is more like "Masters of sex". It's more a historical theater play than a modern thriller. The theme is interesting and I'm going to keep watching - for now - but I'm still a bit disappointed. At least the first 1,5 episode is very talky - instead of "show, don't tell" the actors actually TELL you everything. And it's obvious that the director was aware of this, since scene after scene consists of people talking to eachother for a few minutes, then walk a few steps somewhere in order for SOMETHING to happen, while continuing to talk, and then talk some more. Now, there are lots of series and movies that depend on talking to a large extent - Oliver Stone's "JFK", for example - but if you are going to do it that way, you need actors (and direction) that fill the conversations with drama through their voices and physical expression. During the whole first episode, the whole cast seemed to have one neutral expression all the time, regardless of context and content. This made the essentially thrilling serial-killer-theme about as exciting as a discussion about city planning. There was simply no DRAMA, just information. My main impression was that this was not just a series set at the end of the 1970s - it felt like a series MADE in th 70s. If the first two episodes had been a (good) 2 hour Fincher movie, everything essential in the first two episodes would have been told during the first 20-30 minutes. Yes, the series probably aims to tell the history of how knowledge about serial killers came about, but since a lot of that knowledge is, well, common knowledge today, it could be much more fast-paced. A lot of the dialogue feels like a (very basic) textbook text about serial killers. Not a lot actually HAPPENS, and when it does, it's not very dramatic. Still, it's interesting, and I want to see where it leads. But if the show doesn't pick up the pace and, most of all, manages to be more tense and exciting in the next one or two episodes, I don't think I'll bother finishing it.