The Jane Mysteries: A Deadly Prescription

Delightful little mystery series, based around the talented singer who becomes a sleuth to "right wrongs" and carry on her uncle's legacy, solving cold cases that have gone wrong. It follows the Mystery tradition that a murder demands resolution, so that becomes the MacGuffin to create the mystery. A bit on nice music, not much blood and gore ( huge plus), and a nice puzzle to try and solve before our sleuth figures it out. They come to a good end, bad guy caught, and everything put to rights in the end. Great for an evening's distraction. Jodie has a lovely voice, and makes it fun. Hope to see more of these.

The plot and action seem to lurch along and jump suddenly to the next plot point without adequately taking the viewer along with the characters. The acting is quite hammy at points and can be a great cause for humor, but that is probably not what the cast, director, or producers intend. These movies compare poorly to other Hallmark mystery movies like the Aurora Teagarden movies that these seem to want to emulate. We were greatly disappointed from that standpoint as we have been great fans of those and other Hallmark mystery movie series. We watched the first one and were hopeful that the second one would improve the grounding in some sort of credible reality, but we were sorely disappointed.

Much like the first film in this series, it is entertaining for (probably) unintended reasons.

The acting is occasionally bad in the way you typically think of bad acting...but more often bad in the overacting sense. Especially the actor playing the teenager falsely accused of murder. But even beyond him...it's like a high school theater production.

The script is also pretty shoddy. Credit where due, Hallmark mysteries tend to be pretty well written. I feel like they're the best source for modern cozy mysteries. The main issue with this one was that it was both confusing and at times uninspired.

If you already like Hallmark movies, then you'll probably like this one. For the rest of us it's a big no. The story is predictable. The acting is hammy but fine. It's not a bad movie per se, it's just a movie that knows its audience and I'm not it.

Let's face it, this is for old cat-ladies who are easily entertained. I'm not knocking it. Jodie Sweetin, get your payday on, girl, you earned it. But to those who may want a little bit of critique: Maybe a little bit of subtlety wouldn't be a bad thing. I know you need to play up the emotions, but dial it back just a tiny bit so it's believable. Also, there is no mystery in this mystery. I get why it's simplistic but it's very predictable.

SO MANY THINGS WRONG

I don't think the writers or the directors have ever seen a good mystery. No cameras in the pharmacy, really? For our interrogation of a 16-year-old without an adult or an attorney, really? The 16-year-old they just wants to fill his mom's prescription but wants to use a 45 to force the pharmacist to fill it? A van rear ends a car and they fix it up by using duct tape, really?

This is only a small sampling of all the weird stuff in this show.

If you're a fan of mysteries, cop, or lawyer shows don't waste your time. You won't like it.