Page 20 - MidWeek - June 2, 2021

20 MIDWEEK JUNE 2, 2021
Rotten
All In With ‘Easttown’ Series
BY CHRIS MCKINNEY
PAPAYAS
For years, I’ve been a sucker for stories set in one of those North- eastern towns barely held to- gether by high school sports, church, and lifelong friend- ships or grudges. Small towns where industry has vanished, property prices have plum- meted, drug use has boomed and the people, who all know each other, are hanging on by a thread. I’m talking Richard Russo country. Give me that setting and a murder mystery, and I’m all in.
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tive who spent her entire life in Easttown. The star of her high school basketball team a quarter century before, Mare is now saddled with an aging mother, a resentful daughter, a 4-year-old grandson and a case she hasn’t been able to solve in over a year. Her ex-husband lives next door and is about to get remarried. Like the town she polices, she’s barely holding it togeth- er. Then, when her daughter’s classmate is found murdered, and she personally knows ev- ery suspect, Mare is willing to dig into all leads — to expose secrets. The next thing you know, the guts of Easttown
spill out for all to see. She finds enemies in people she’s known her entire life.
embodiment of Easttown.
By the third episode, my fear was that too many characters and too much forced misdirec- tion would dilute the essence of this story. A story about a girl’s murder, and a cop who’s juggling the case along with some seriously heavy and ra- zor-sharp personal baggage. However, by the end of the fourth episode, I knew, like the story’s main character, there was no way I was not going to see this thing through the end. In other words, Winslet is so good, I don’t even care. Her
ery wrinkle and varicose vein of this diminishing place. Cre- ator Brad Ingelsby is from a Catholic Pennsylvanian town like this. I’m still feeling like a few too many murder mys- tery tropes have been thrust onto this story, perhaps by the Warner Bros. powers that be. The misdirection is frequent- ly ham-handed. However, overall, what I’ve seen so far is very, very good. There are shades of Elizabeth Moss in Top of the Lake and Gillian An- derson in The Fall — and that’s excellent company to be in.
HBO Max’s Mare of East- town is set in small-town Pennsylvania. Kate Winslet plays Mare Sheehan, a detec-
Winslet is wonderful in this series. Her Mare Sheehan is haggard, stubborn, stoic, and occasionally hot-tempered and mean. Winslet fully inhab- its this vaping, cold pizza and Cheez Whiz-eating, beer-swig- ging cop. Her past, her present and it feels like her future are stuffed with tragedy. Through most of the series (I haven’t seen the last episode yet), you can tell that Mare’s aching to break down, but she refuses to. Shoot, she won’t even blink. Refusing to fold under adver- sity after adversity, Mare is the
obsession became mine.
The series itself looks great. It feels authentic. We see ev-
It’s been a long time since I started a series and couldn’t wait for the next episode to be
Kate Winslet stars in the HBO Max series Mare of Easttown. PHOTO BY EVAN AGOSTINI/INVISION/AP
released. I’m eager to see Mare of Easttown’s series finale. Not so much to find out whodunnit, but I want to see what becomes of Mare and whether she fi- nally earns a much-deserved graceful resolution.
chrismckinney808@gmail.com
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