Dating Is Murder

Normally I enjoy the Hailey Dean movies, but this one was incredibly predictable. If you're a fan of the series, watch it. If not, give it a pass.

Attorney turned therapist Hailey Dean (Kellie Martin) is pulled into another investigation when a popular new dating app links multiple missing persons cases from around the city. Reuniting with her old team, Hailey discovers the potential dangers of online interaction, and must track down a killer before anyone else gets hurt.

Hailey Dean is more serious than the other Hallmark heroines such as Jennifer from Garage Sale and Hannah Swensen from Murder, She Baked and it's not too light, but nevertheless it's an interesting mystery, quite fast-paced and fairly absorbing. Gets more suspenseful towards the end. The acting is quite competent, however the heroine can be a bit annoying with her overbearingly bossy and know-it-all ways.

The third Hailey Dean mystery finds our therapist former ADA played by Kellie Martin taking on a private investigation of a woman who is a friend of her mother. The daughter went missing a few days ago and Martin takes on the missing persons investigation. It doesn't remain that for she finds her body buried under a pile of leaves in a wooded area where she was known to go jogging and hiking.

With a former colleague from DA's office at her side Viv Leacock, Martin does her own murder investigation. Unlike some of the other female detectives in the Hallmark channel pantheon, Hailey Dean because she was in law enforcement gets far more cooperation from the authorities with no resentment. Surely more than Aurora Teagarden. Leacock and her have a relationship similar to Bridget Moynahan and Steven Schirippa from Blue Bloods.

They zero in on the fact that the deceased was dating from a new kind of dating App, meeting dates through that which seems to be a modern trend. The App is the creation of Toby Levins with big assist from Kieran Sequoia. Martin and Leacock pick the wrong suspect at first, but they do get ir right though it's a close run thing for Martin as to her very life.

This is the third entry in this series and a good one.

7/10 - my absolute favorite Hailey Dean so far and that is saying something!

I'm torn between the excitement of using an older woman as the protagonist - yippee and that the actress playing her mother, and the dating CEO cannot act. As the story goes its decent, and the Hailey doesn't put down the police like so many other shows. She is smart but not over-barring again unlike other shows. A decent and likable move by Hallmark (I don't like other Hallmark movies because the story-lines are adult fairy tales that demean women who live fairy tale versions of reality).