His and Hers–They, Theirs Anyone?
This mini-series thriller, based on the eponymous novel by Alice Feeney, opens with the brutal murder of a young woman, Rachel Hopkins (Jamie Tisdale).She was in a car late at night oin an isolated road in the back woods of Dahlonega, Georgia. Shadows of the woman being murdered, with rain clouding the viewer’s identification of either the victim or the murderer, sets the scene for the subsequent police investigation.
His & Hers follows Anna (Tessa Thompson), a high-powered television newscaster, and her estranged husband Jack (Jon Bernthal), a local police detective, as they get entangled in the investigation. Anna and Jack are the titular His and Hers.
The victim, Rachel Hopkins , is revealed through flashbacks, to have known both Anna and Jack. The small-town community full of secrets, lies, and revenge implicates both Anna and Jack, as well as his sister and Anna’s friends from her adolescence.
Over the course of the series, Anna’s private Catholic high school experience with Rachel, and a clique of “mean girls”–Helen Wang (Poppy Liu) and Zoe Harper (Marine Ireland) and Catherine Kelly (Astrid Rotenberry) – expose the bullying, manipulation, and cutthroat “tricks” perpetrated as “humor “and “joking” on the less popular students. Peer pressure involves complicity.
Both Jack and Anna are compromised, having known the victim and presenting conflicts of interest. Somehow Jack has impunity for heinous acts that would cause suspension in a reputable police department. And Anna is equally ruthless in fighting to get her job back in Atlanta as a star news anchor. Quickly both become suspects in the murder of Rachel.
His and Hers incorporates multiple subplots in six forty-minute episodes. Besides the murder, the expected desperate coverups, there are extramarital affairs, blackmail, career power-grab maneuvers, caring for a mother with dementia, and the grief following the death of a child. All of these plot points feature in twisted scenes in this police procedural.
As in many contemporary mysteries, particularly police procedurals, there is the underappreciated but highly skilled female assistant detective partnering with an often condescending, insufferable senior officer. In His and Hers Priya (Sunita Mani) fills the role expertly, refusing to accept the lies and coverups of her superior officers. And reluctant family members– Anna’s mother, Alice (Crystal R. Fox) , and Jack’s sister Zoë add unexpected twists to the investigation.
While this whodunit has roughly crafted story structure, it kept this viewer hooked until the very end. Even with its too-brief character development of the “mean girls”, Jack’s sister, and Anna’s mother, the number of red herrings are constantly changing. What is not totally successful is the surprise ending, packed at the end with so few clues, this viewer felt cheated. Which of the many suspects were viable murderers? It could have been any of them. And there are no convincing arguments for why it should be that particular ending, particularly with the clumsily structured distractions to throw the viewer off track.
A mystery for mystery lovers, but not one that pulls you in from the first scene and never lets you go.
Availability: Netflix