Just One Look

What a frustrating watch. This show had potential, but the characters? Absolutely infuriating.

Let's start with the dumb wife-her husband goes missing under mysterious circumstances, she gets shot at, her kids are threatened... and her first instinct? Not to call her husband's colleagues or get real help, but to start making jewelry. Priorities, I guess. Then she turns down private protection-why? She's a mousy, unprepared person up against actual criminals, yet somehow thinks she can handle this alone? And to top it off, she conveniently knows nothing-nothing about a major accident in her past, nothing about her husband. How useful are you, lady?

The dumber husband isn't any better. He notices someone following him, confronts them without being armed, then turns his back like it's all good. Of course, he gets sucker punched. He escapes... and then just gets found again. Fantastic.

The police? Useless. Casual, sarcastic, wasting time on unnecessary details, and just completely unsympathetic. Then there's the prosecutor, who starts off with what seemed like an important storyline about his daughter but does absolutely nothing except stalk the dumb wife. His actual contribution? Zero.

Even the dumb wife's friend, who at least had the sense to call the police quickly, still managed to fumble her role. If you're trying to be subtle while snooping, maybe don't openly announce your sneak peeks? Just saying.

Then we have the bad guy, and honestly? Props to him for being the only competent character. He keeps winning, and at this point, I don't even mind.

The story itself? A mess. Too many pointless side characters that add nothing. The initial intrigue gets buried under ridiculous character choices, and by the end, you just don't care anymore. Hard pass.

Coben's books are all eerily alike, and sadly, this movie adaption is no exception. Boring and formulaic from the get go, it never recovers. No character development, subtlety or surprises. I tried hard to ignore my prejudice against American crime fiction (James Patterson being the worst offender). At least Coben seems to write the books himself, but at this stage I reckon I could write the next one... maybe an easy way to make those elusive millions without actually having to put in the hard work? Dreams are free...however, I'd be boring myself, I've read too many excellent - predominsnzly British - whodunnits. By all accounts, American audiences are looking for different fare.

It's pretty much exactly what I'd expect after watching two other adaptations of his books. (I find them frustrating and silly but treat them like a guilty pleasure from time to time.) He's got a formula, which makes certain plot points very predictable. Certain characters always make foolish, questionable choices. The people mentioning the fact that this one is Polish are revealing themselves. It's so similar to Fool Me Once. If you think that one was great and this was horrible, and if you complain about the Polish names and can't spell the name Jacek when we saw and heard it ad nauseam, that's a "you" issue.

Another story with so many holes. Frustrating the viewer as they ponder through the scenes as to whether this or that would happen. Could be so much better. Whether the author or the producers I get the impression one does not get out much. Usual bring in a pretty main character a bit of sex an old prosecutor and make a mix and hope. Watch if you like murder mystery but do not expect much. So many errors. A prison inmate on the loose that the police can't catch and seem to be impotent. No reason for all the scenes. No connections between characters. A story that gets worse as you watch. Directed as in the 70's but set today.

Wanted to like this but as others have said there are a lot of plot holes and a lot of weird choices by characters. I think the actors are mostly good but the material they are given just isn't great.

Maybe Harlan Coben series are just getting churned out too fast, the books seem more believable and logical. The mystery is there and the pieces start to fall into place but they seem a little forced, like no character really seems to know what they are doing or how to react to events. It's hard to root for any of them. I'm giving it a 6 because I did finish it so I guess it was enough that I wanted to see the resolution. Slow burn.