Bellevue

Just finished the first season (will there be more?) and I LOVED it. At times some of the characters were confusing and seemed of little consequence to the finale and the whole story, but if you had patience, enjoyed the mystery and creepy feeling of the setting, for me, the ending was great. Fantastic. And nothing I saw coming. An extra point for that. Unfortunately I will admit again that some characters who seemed insignificant were very significant in the end, the tale that needed telling and the old murder that was solved, so I understand that some viewers were frustrated. Overall I found the major players diverse enough in personality that it kept me glued for the whole season. Every time I see Anna Paquin I still think of "The Piano," despite how long ago that film came out. All grown up, I still see that little girl's face. I have to give this show 8/10 stars. It kept me stuck on CBC after Murdoch, and that's impressive.

I really enjoyed this story in spite of all the unexpected twists and turns. Complicated, weird and even gory at times, but with so many deeply-felt emotions and a real understanding of family relationships (somewhat extreme and perverted here). The setting is wonderfully eerie too with the mine and the woods, the darkness and the snow at the end. The acting is wonderful. I had only seen Anna Paquin in the film "the Piano", and she has retained the passionate intensity of that little girl. Allen Leech is very moving in all his clumsy warmth.I didn't know any of the Canadian actors, but I found their portrayal of these troubled characters very believable. The young girl who plays Daisy is so cute and vibrant she manages to lighten up the dark mood. So much better than many popular shows, it is complex and moving!

I find the premise and plot very interesting and I am eager to see how the show develops. The characters however aren't very interesting but I feel like the plot makes up for it. My only negative about the show, which is a huge negative, is Anna Paquin's acting. It's just bad. The way she delivers most of her lines is just off. Her inflections often miss the mark. She often says her lines without enough feeling. It's hard to watch. Not everyone will notice these things about her acting. But if you generally pick up on bad acting you most likely will notice that Anna's acting is not up to par with the rest of the cast.

I don't really understand why it has a 6.7 from 94 people, didn't anybody watch this show and just some haters gave it a low rating? It had only one episode yet, those reviews are also the reason for my review.

From the other reviews I expected the show to start really slow or with bad actors, but everything is good enough for a TV show and the story is not so different from the very good first season of True Detective.

I'm only bothered by some little things like why would you go in there alone in the dark, you know what I mean, but the story makes up for that, a lot happens and it's not slow at all. I would maybe give it a 7.5 but I'll round it up to 8, because I truly am curious about the next episode.

Bellevue is a dying northern Ontario town struggling with drugs after its mine closed. There's a native reservation close by. Annie Ryder (Anna Paquin) is a hard-charging police detective in town. She's the single mother to Daisy. Daisy's father Eddie Rowe is her on-again off-again boyfriend. Her police father was killed investigating the murder of Sandy Driver over 20 years ago. Another kid has gone missing. It's Jesse Sweetland, the 16 year old transgender hockey star. Maggie is his widowed mother. Peter Welland is the police chief. Annie used to find notes in the woods which she assumed to be from her dead father. She gets a new message which leads to clues about Jesse.

It's another dead kid mystery. The thing about dead kid mysteries is that it should start with a dead kid right away. I did wonder about all the police effort in finding a missing kid when the town is over-run with drugs. Like one of the officer said, he's probably run off somewhere. I'm willing to give it a pass since he is the hockey star. The other problematic issue are the notes with the dead father. Sometimes, it feels too gimmicky although I do like the original sin message. There is a bit too much exposition in the pilot. The over-riding positive is Anna Paquin. She's a top notch actress injecting real power and charisma into this project.