Unbelievable - Netflix

The Black Oil

I was just looking up Merritt Wever a few minutes ago when this appeared. Topical and probably fairly heavy going at times. Hopefully the police side won't be too straightforward.

Does this story already sound familiar? That’s because the series is based on the true events in T. Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong’s Pulitzer Prize-winning article from ProPublica and The Marshall Project titled “An Unbelievable Story of Rape,” as well as the radio episode of This American Life tackling this same subject, “Anatomy of Doubt.”

https://ew.com/tv/2019/07/18/unbelievable-trailer-toni-collette-merritt-wever/

Arriving Sept 13th.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTIkUzkbzQk

Slydice

The young actress is one of the girls from Booksmart!

Delta2113

Looking forward to this and with another great Australian actress Toni Collette.

Unearthly

Slydice wrote: »

The young actress is one of the girls from Booksmart!

I know her from Justified as Loretta

JP Liz V1

Slydice wrote: »

The young actress is one of the girls from Booksmart!

Kaitlyn Denver

The Black Oil

I've pretty positive things to say about the first episode. It's tough going, but has got the execution. Marie (Dever) has to relive her experience 4 times verbally at first, then in writing. Then again. The cops are all men, her initial support are all women. Because of the state of the web these days I'm expecting complaints about SJWs, etc. The show is not about dividing men and women, but rather how the whole 'infrastructure' that responds to rape is almost as horrendous as the crime itself. The second detective is deliberately OTT and there is a lot going on here - victim blaming, accusations of attention seeking, betrayal, fear and belief. Marie is also bombarded with 'how are you?' multiple times. In the real world you'd like to think some simple gestures like a police officer using his first name, rather than title might happen. The nurses were quite clinical too. Camera angles are key, see for instance a simple shopping trip.

Well worth a watch.

Agent Coulson

That was one of the best opening episodes to any series I have watched.

Top class from all the actors.

The writing the direction and the editing was so well done to build the story.

Sudden Valley

This is a hard series to watch, knowing where it's going. A very good understated main actress.

Agent Coulson

Episode 2 is just as powerful.



Knowing this is based on true events I really want to google but I'm doing my best not too.

The Black Oil

Agent Coulson wrote: »

Episode 2 is just as powerful.

Phone call to the friend was hard, gut wrenching. Marie rejected by all, so sad.

Excellent intro for Collette.

Agent Coulson

Up to episode 5 and for me Merritt Wever is giving a stand out performance.

This is as good series as I have watched in a long time.

adox

I watched this in one sitting today.

Up there with the best that Netflix have produced. Stunning performances all around and brilliantly written.

Fakediamond

Brilliant from start to finish, couldn’t stop watching it.

Agent Coulson

WOW Unbelievable is an understatement.


Just finished it today and without a doubt an amazing series that should be watched by everyone.


Everyone involved in the making of this should be winning every award going over the next year.

Now off to Google to find the Pulitzer Prize winning story that this was based on.

Sudden Valley

I dont generally binge watch shows but this was so good i had to see the resolution. Apart from the main actress the cop actress Meritt wever was very good. I thought the show would make me miserable but found it very hopeful on the end.

metaoblivia

I watched this over the weekend, and admittedly skipped the first episode because I'm familiar with the story and what happened to Marie - how she was treated by police initially - still just makes me so mad that I couldn't bring myself to watch it. But it was a fantastic series. I hope to see it pick up some awards in the future because work like that should be recognized.

Heckler

Binge watched all day. Excellent show. Had never heard of the case. And 3 Justified cast reunited albeit briefly !

Walter Bishop

Finished it, absolutely superb, one of the best dramas on Netflix in a long time.

Slydice

I'd forgotten so I just rewatched the trailer after the first episode. It feels so different to the episode. I guess it's not going to be one persons story.

1: Kaitlyn Dever really did a top performance. Showing what it's like having to go through that over and over again. Then it just felt like a gut-punch when the others stabbed her in the back. I hope that's not the end of her story in this!

Mr Crispy

That was very, very good. Great acting all round.

CosmicFool

A superb show. The cast was excellent.

What a show. I'm wasn't familiar with the source material. I've been doing a bit of reading, was it a bit too sympathetic to police who coerced her? I was also convinced that Marie had made it up, but as the show went on and stuck with Marie, it was obvious that her trauma was going to turn out to be real. I don't fully see why she claimed she made it up. I found a quote

In this report a sex crimes supervisor noted that Marie's situation was “nothing short of the victim being coerced into admitting that she lied about the rape.” The investigation concluded that “bullying” and “hounding” led to Marie's admittance of false reporting.

I feel like, given the information that they had, the detectives were correct in thinking she made it up. I didn't get the sense of coercion at all. This led to a better drama but didn't seem to reflect the reality of the situation.

Podcast from 3 years back about the real events :

https://www.thisamericanlife.org/581/anatomy-of-doubt

Slydice

2: So

relieved Marie didn't jump.

Detective Duvall is so much better than

those two gob****es from the first episode. She was like a machine. I can't believe they got so little when Amber did so much. Her strength really hitting hard

when she got in touch with her friend.

Strong entrance from Toni Collette. I assume she's gonna team up with Duvall!

Slydice

3: Ok, I'm thinking Duvall and Rasmussen are kinda on the same level. Just

Rasmussen has more resources or a bigger station or something.

Right now, I'm thinking

they'll catch the perp. Could it be Duvalls husband? .. I mean they are kinda pointing towards a cop and he looks the description we've been given... I dunno

Hoping they find out about

Marie and clear her name.

Slydice

4: Ok, ok, I get it show. Even though

Duvall looks to be making the right moves and going in the right direction, she might be inexperienced and is making mistakes. I wonder could this be trying to link it up to Duvalls husband again.

I'm guessing this

court thing and possibly reaching out to the other cases might clear Marie.

Slydice

5: So now

Marie looks at risk.

On the other side it feels like the show is turning to the direction that it

can't be anyone but a cop. Not sure why they didn't think to cross-reference against students who graduated from Kansas too though

Slydice

6: Well.. that

stakeout felt like a waste of time!

On the other side, I'm thinking

things are looking bad for Marie

Slydice

7: The

Mazda! They caught him on the Mazda! All this evidence! They must have him! Brother even knew there was something up.

Looks like they'll

get to Marie in time too!

Slydice

Just finished. Very strong show overall. Top performances from all involved.

8: I feel like

yer man was taken care of and won't ever get out. I don't know about parole though. Wierd about the kidnapping and password. I hope the cop just lets a password breaker keep going for a few years. If there are other victims out there, they deserve to know. Marie almost didn't find out!

As for

Marie, I don't think anything can take those years back. I was with the lawyer in thinking she should get more. Very frustrating situation there. She seemed ok on the phone call to Duvall. Hope she reclaimed something back.

Slydice

The article is mostly behind a paywall but it has the detectives at the top:
The hunt for a serial rapist
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/the-hunt-for-a-serial-rapist-62zcjs682

Detectives Stacy Galbraith (left) and Edna Hendershot, photographed in Westminster police station in Colorado

Fakediamond

You can read the true version here.

Y

The Black Oil

Finished it earlier. At 8 episodes it's on the leaner side for Netflix, and no 70 min episodes. It's very impressive overall and at times reminded me of HBO's Chernobyl in its brutality.

Elizabeth Marvel's foster mother was just plain unkind at times. I was almost going to take issue with how some of the third episode seemed to be overly explaining things to the audience, but perhaps it needed to be said since most of us don't have contact with the police end of such serious investigations. The studies about police and domestic violence - I'm gonna guess these are not Hollywood fiction. It reminded me somewhat of The Sopranos pulling in research pretty late on it its run. I wonder what the authors of the forensic guide think now. Much of the show's arguments (Duvall and Rasmussen, in particular) felt like the era we're in even though this was set a decade ago. There were one or two contrived elements such as Grace going to the bar to try and get the cop's DNA. I didn't really buy that.

Hard to pick a stand out episode here. I liked how Duvall called out some of her officers, somewhere midways through, iirc. The genetics intern nerd even got a moment or two.

7 was Marie finally making a connection (counsellor). You'll note this was very much contrasted with McCarthy's situation and the discovery of the pink camera, shoes, memory sticks and his 'collection' and indeed the forensic assessment of his body. I never thought it was going to be a cop, but I did worry things were going to slip for their hands almost to the end.

I think we were all holding our breaths when the forensic computer tech said there was another folder. Please be Marie, please be Marie. Jesus.

8 had the phone call to the original detective and that was a real reminder of how much of a slap in the face it is not to be believed in the first place. Horrible. And yeah, why didn't he apologise when he went to Marie's workplace? Unbelievable. I think that's a tricky role to cast and pull off. Rasmussen didn't want to do women bonding thing. That's in keeping how we knew her character. The Marie/Duvall call more than made up for it. And we saw her guitar in the finale too.

Court room - this almost felt like a nod to the women who confronted Larry Nassar during his case.

jluv

Just finished this.. excellent.
I watched on advice here but avoided all the spoiler/ links.
Gonna read all of those now.

Walter Bishop

The main thing that pleased me is that they didn't go for any ridiculous twists like

the killer being the husband of, or related to, or whatever, of any of the characters

There's more than enough of that nonsense out there, it made a great change just to see an exceptionally well acted and well written drama.

Walter Bishop

Walter Bishop wrote: »

The main thing that pleased me is that they didn't go for any ridiculous twists like

the killer being the husband of, or related to, or whatever, of any of the characters

There's more than enough of that nonsense out there, it made a great change just to see an exceptionally well acted and well written drama.

It was good that they

alluded to the possibility of that though. I liked that you began to suspect almost anyone. Gave a great sense of paranoia and claustrophobia.

zapper55

Walter Bishop wrote: »

The main thing that pleased me is that they didn't go for any ridiculous twists like

the killer being the husband of, or related to, or whatever, of any of the characters

There's more than enough of that nonsense out there, it made a great change just to see an exceptionally well acted and well written drama.

I thought it was leading that way. Glad it didnt in the end.

yerwanthere123

Finished this last night, absolutely brilliant almost from start to finish, and top quality acting from the three leading ladies. I was particularly impressed by Merritt Wever, I'd never seen her in anything prior to this. Unbelievable may end up being the finest show I'll watch this year.

walshb

Great show!

Jurgen The German

yerwanthere123 wrote: »

Finished this last night, absolutely brilliant almost from start to finish, and top quality acting from the three leading ladies. I was particularly impressed by Merritt Wever, I'd never seen her in anything prior to this. Unbelievable may end up being the finest show I'll watch this year.

You must not have watched Chernobyl.

Anyway, finished episode 7 last night. Decent show but not feeling the rave reviews of it. Colette is hugely watchable and the girl playing Marie is wonderfully understated.

Jurgen The German

Jurgen The German wrote: »

You must not have watched Chernobyl.

Anyway, finished episode 7 last night. Decent show but not feeling the rave reviews of it. Colette is hugely watchable and the girl playing Marie is wonderfully understated.

Yeah its definitely good but its not without its flaws. I thought the chemistry between the two detectives was awful. Felt really forced.

yerwanthere123

Jurgen The German wrote: »

You must not have watched Chernobyl.

Anyway, finished episode 7 last night. Decent show but not feeling the rave reviews of it. Colette is hugely watchable and the girl playing Marie is wonderfully understated.

I did, but I much preferred Unbelievable.

The Black Oil

yerwanthere123 wrote: »

Finished this last night, absolutely brilliant almost from start to finish, and top quality acting from the three leading ladies. I was particularly impressed by Merritt Wever, I'd never seen her in anything prior to this. Unbelievable may end up being the finest show I'll watch this year.

Check out Godless, also on Netflix.

Cina

Four episodes in and it's very good.

Merritt Weaver, though... I loved her in Godless but she feels all wrong in this. Something about her character irritates me and the missus to no end. She doesn't feel believable as a tough, meticulous cop (Toni Colette certainly did, though) and the voice she's putting on is very, very grating. I guess I'm in the minority though looking at the responses in here.

The Black Oil

Isn't Weaver the more empathetic one, rather than tough? She is quite insistent on the forensics and that the uniforms don't leave the scene.

You're terrible Muriel

strawdog

Cina wrote: »

Four episodes in and it's very good.

Merritt Weaver, though... I loved her in Godless but she feels all wrong in this. Something about her character irritates me and the missus to no end. She doesn't feel believable as a tough, meticulous cop (Toni Colette certainly did, though) and the voice she's putting on is very, very grating. I guess I'm in the minority though looking at the responses in here.

Yeah we had it the other way around. Merritt Weaver character had a believable empathy and quiet determination tempered by inexperience. Thought she judged it well. Toni Collette's character seemed all over the place, an amalgamation of a few cop cliches, and felt to me like she was phoning in the performance at times. Different folks I guess. Put that down mostly to some uneven writing. Interestingly when I looked up articles on the real life characters it's Toni Collettes who seems to deviate the most from the actual person

Cina

The Black Oil wrote: »

Isn't Weaver the more empathetic one, rather than tough? She is quite insistent on the forensics and that the uniforms don't leave the scene.

I moreso meant tough on her co-colleagues and workers, but that's largely due to her being so meticulous and obsessive about the case, or at least I assume that's how she's supposed to come across.

It's obviously deliberate by the writer's to show the disparity between her and the detectives Marie had in the first episode, and the difference having someone like her makes to your case, but there was just.. something about the character that I found very irritating. The delivery of her lines, or maybe Weaver isn't that believable as a character like that, I can't really pinpoint it, and it's obviously against the grain of what most think, but my missus agreed with me so I'll go with that!

Then again I found the acting and production values pretty uneven throughout. I don't think it was a particularly well produced or polished show, but the subject matter was so intriguing and for the most part, characters like Marie and Colette's were so good that it makes it more than the sum of its parts. You certainly couldn't compare the overall "quality" to Chernobyl or When they See Us.

strawdog

Cina wrote: »

Then again I found the acting and production values pretty uneven throughout. I don't think it was a particularly well produced or polished show, but the subject matter was so intriguing and for the most part, characters like Marie and Colette's were so good that it makes it more than the sum of its parts. You certainly couldn't compare the overall "quality" to Chernobyl or When they See Us.

Agree there were a number of shortcomings. As you say, the strength of the story just about papered over the cracks. It reminded me most of the Unabomber show in that it was compulsive enough viewing but felt very 'made for tv' in the old sense of that phrase. Maybe a bit harsh as I did enjoy watching it but I think the standard of TV has been set so high recently that its hard not to be a bit irked when things fall a little below.

Standman

Great show, harrowing to watch.

One insignificant thing I was puzzled by: Why did they make such a point of showing Detective Duvall putting her gun into the safe in her house? They way they filmed it so front-and-centre made me think they were setting something up - like she'd forget to lock it at some point or her kids would get into it - but it never came into play after that.

Standman

Standman wrote: »

Great show, harrowing to watch.

One insignificant thing I was puzzled by: Why did they make such a point of showing Detective Duvall putting her gun into the safe in her house? They way they filmed it so front-and-centre made me think they were setting something up - like she'd forget to lock it at some point or her kids would get into it - but it never came into play after that.

Possibly a red herring to keep you thinking. Her husband was one big red herring.