Manual de Assassinato para Boas Garotas

An interesting but uneven mystery drama that never quite manages to firmly find its feet. There's lots to enjoy in this series from the lovely shooting locations, the very good lead performances to the actual mystery itself and the almost cold case style investigation which follows. I haven't read the book so can't comment on how accurate it is. The series sometimes starts onto territory that feels familiar and a couple of bits feel slightly shoehorned in, including a I Know What You Did Last Summer style accident.

A certain tall blonde young woman will also appear exactly when our protagonist needs her to in order to help. The friends at times get some development at other times feel superfluous. You start to realise soon all the white men in the series are bad in some often vile and criminal way, ethnic men though are mostly kind hearted and caring, imagine if the BBC did the opposite. It's become almost weakness and trope now you actually start to roll your eyes at. The casting is mostly quite good though one actor playing a pressured 17 years looks not a day over 40. Smart phones get used a lot in the series but usually to advance the plot along. Our main character gets to give lots of self-righteous rants at different point meanwhile her Watson friend somehow seems to be entirely void of anything approaching a realistic life, often just appearing by a lake with his hands in his pockets in order for our protagonist to talk with him, how longs he been stood staring at that tree?

We get a fair bit of drugs in the series, a slightly unsettling list of professions you think you can trust like teachers and policemen who are very much not trustworthy to say the least. Plot holes are simply gigantic, a certain accident involving an animal makes no sense, nor the motives of people really. Some bits are also unclear but for the most part I could follow it. Its all very idealised at times the perfect cottage england homes, the traffic free streets, the dog that never barks or gets too excited, or causes any mess or problems. The parents who exchange witty banter, it's all a bit tv land. I do like a good mystery though, the thing moves along nicely, it's fairly well done technically and so I give it a 6 overall. Despite its slightly funny character overall its not a comedy touching on some interesting themes relevant to young people about racism, parenting, friendship, drugs, consent and intergrity.

The whole point of the book that made it so famous was that you solve this case alongside Pip, which the series decided not to do, losing the whole point of the story.

Important and interesting scenes from the book were lost and e.g. 5 scenes were merged into 1 with simple dialogue without any connection to the actors.

The information of the murder is thrown away pointlessly without any suspense, since the series starts essentialistically from the end of the book. Unfortunately it didn't come out the way the book deserved.

As for the actors, I don't think they did a bad job, they just had to deal with a bad script that didn't let the audience to get involved enough in actor's lives and get involved in the story.

Maybe it's a good work for those who haven't read the book, but I think for anyone who has read it the differences and missteps were annoying.

If I hadn't read the books I probably would have loved this. But I did read the books - several times. Sadly, this series feels like the people who made it didn't read the books at all. More like they had the plot told to them and then they pieces it together from memory and got a vague resemblance to the books.

I'm so sad, because I was genuinely so excited. It sucks because I think the actors did a good job, even if they didn't look like what I pictured them. There was such a lack of depth, and where in the books the readers were along with Pip as she did the work, and dug into the dark corners of the case, this just felt like she accidentally stumbled into the answers without really asking any questions. And Ravi wasn't even really part of the solving the way he was in the books. And where was Stanley? Too many important factors missing, and it's so sad, because this could have been so good, and I think if the actors had been given something closer to the source material it could have been really satisfying for everyone.

I guess I'll try to see it as its own thing, if it gets renewed.

I was really looking forward to this as I loved the book. In general it was a good adaptation, but I don't think the acting was the best. Sadly multiple actors lacked depth and sincerity in their parts. Don't get me wrong, I think there was a lot of good acting (e.g. Cara and Naomi) but the two leads (Pip and Ravi) weren't particularly convincing. Emma's accent also falters often. There were details missed from the book which I suppose is necessary for a series, but the book felt more rich in detail and storyline quality. However, it is bingeworthy as the story is similar to the book, I just think it could have been (much) better.

Just finished watching the show on Netflix.

A few things, apparently this series is based on a book, and I really wanna read it to know more about the details of the story/plot.

The story wasn't predictable which is good but I felt like it felt very unrealistic at times.

Since I am not a teenager in 2024, it's hard to relate to the environment the characters are in.

The actors did a good job, especially "Sal" the few minutes he's on screen, I really felt his presence. His face and emotions were perfect for the scenes.

If you enjoy "true crime" you will like this refreshing series. Kinda like Nancy Drew but in the modern times.