The Good Daughter Is One Exhausting Trauma Dump After Another
A cast led by Rose Byrne, Meghann Fahy, and Brendan Gleeson can't save this Peacock thriller from its maudlin script.
The Good Daughter, a Peacock series, kicks off with a brutal home invasion in a small Georgia town. The masked intruders target a defense lawyer, his wife, and two daughters, setting off a chain of traumatic events that affect the daughters' lives as adults. The series, which premieres on Nov. 12, focuses on these traumas, with perhaps a dozen more trauma dumps happening throughout the six episodes.
Charlie Quinn, played by Meghann Fahy, is the younger sister of Rusty, a once-admired defense lawyer now an aging, alcoholic, and socially ostracized man. Charlie, a brash, crude lawyer, works closely with her father and unexpectedly finds himself entangled in a murder investigation involving her sister Sam, played by Rose Byrne.
Sam, a successful lawyer in the city, returns home to the rural town after a long absence to assist her sister in the case. Byrne, Gleeson, and Fahy deliver strong performances despite the script's reliance on coincidences and contrivances. The plot collects various horrors, exploring the brutal treatment of women, but this isn't a fresh perspective in the genre.
The show also delves into questions of why Rusty remains in his town and continues his destructive occupation, but these issues are dismissed with grandiose metaphors about storytelling and power. Ultimately, Karin Slaughter's novel may have been better served with a different adaptation.
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