Bellevue

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.

A troubled detective with a troubled past in a troubled town full of troubled people runs into trouble trying to solve two troublesome murders of troubled teens. A must see for fans of Anna Paquin, who has little trouble adapting her considerable talents to the minimal demands of this pedestrian and predictable noir flavored melodrama that never quite lives up to the promise of "thrilling and eerie." Nevertheless, the series somehow escapes the utterly tedious as the story meanders from one patch of trouble to the next toward a hammy "all's well that ends well" finale that has characters and cast literally rushing around to tie up loose ends. As Detective Ryder and her troubled family head into the sunset, one cannot help but share their relief that all this trouble might soon be behind them, and wonder what sort of trouble might be concocted in a sequel. Bellevue's Annie Ryder is interesting enough to follow into a fresh situation, especially if Paquin returns.

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 awaited the first episode with high hopes after seeing Paquin knock it out of the park in True Blood, but was very disappointed to say the least. "Annie Ryder" plays just like "Sookie Stackhouse" on a bad day, minus the southern accent. Same facial expressions and body language, same use of words, vocal tones and speech pauses. It doesn't look like Paquin has a real handle on the character, or that she put a lot of effort into really finding that character in herself.

The writing and the other actors (except for Shawn Doyle) did not impress either. The characters feel wooden, the dialogue doesn't flow and it seems like the writers tried to cram way too much plot background and backstory into the first episode. None the characters appears to actually care about any of the other characters, except, again, for Doyle's character Peter Welland.

And for what it's worth, while I had read that the creators found the giant slag heaps at the filming location picturesque and beautiful, all I could think about when they came into view was that some mining company should be sued for creating such a hideous mess of the landscape.

All in all, not one of CBC's finer efforts so far. I'll watch a few more episodes to see how it goes, but my expectations have now hit bottom.

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.