Behind Her Eyes - General Discussion

[Door County Cherry]

Airs Feb. 17 on Netflix

Quote

A single mother enters a world of twisted mind games when she begins an affair with her psychiatrist boss while secretly befriending his mysterious wife.

 

[bilgistic]

Just finished this tonight. I found a lot of it tedious and the cast was lackluster except for the actor playing Louise, who reminds me of Issa Rae. Sue, the coworker, is quite the firecracker.

This could've been cut down by two hours if only to lessen how often Adele told everyone how much she loves David. We get it. The two major twists at the end got me good, I admit. I feel so bad for Louise's son, Adam.

[ursula]

There was too much contrived, let me just call it, stupidity on Louise's part. "Adele" was obviously manipulating her from the start - telling her not to tell her husband that she had made friends with his wife was shady as hell, even before the affair started. So while I wasn't sure at least up to the "black eye" episode whether David was a good guy or not, I knew Adele was shady as hell. And in the last episode when Louise went to her house (to do what exactly?), I was so infuriated! 

Also the fact that she never tells David about the astral projection was another annoying contrivance. And that she alienated her one friend. 

Poor Adam, indeed. I hope his Dad realises how much Louise has changed and pushes for full custody at some point in time. 

[topanga]

I enjoyed this. Mostly because of Simona Brown, the actress playing Louise. Louise was kind, funny, and (usually) smart -- except when she was being naïve. Like when she went over to Adele's house during the fire, I was screaming at "Do go! She's playing you, girl!" at the TV. They were in central London--call the fire department. 

I liked the subtle personality changes David and Adele went through during the series. It kept me wondering who was being truthful and who wasn't. Who's good and who's bad? David started out kind and sweet, he turned into an asshole and then a scary asshole, and finally he was back to being sweet--but dumb as rocks. He didn't notice a change in Louise? And then Adele started out crazy, seem to stabilize, and then went bat-shit crazy. 

Someone please explain the ending to me. Did Rob switch with Adele (and Louise) then kill them because he was in love with David? Or was he simply angry at Adele because she rejected him and at Louise because she betrayed him? 

[partofme]

2 minutes ago, topanga said:Someone please explain the ending to me. Did Rob switch with Adele (and Louise) then kill them because he was in love with David? Or was he simply angry at Adele because she rejected him and at Louise because she betrayed him? 

I read the book which annoyed me because I was reading a mystery/thriller book and suddenly its a completely different genre, but in the book it was clear that Rob did this because he was in love with David.  

[BlackberryJam]

I agree with the comments above. Simona Brown made this show. I would have liked it better without the astral projection. 

Also, I knew Adele was evil because of her monochrome outfits and crazy chick hair.

[jenn31]

Yes, poor Adam (and Adele, as it turns out she was the only good person) but I loved the macabre ending. Tired of everything’s great endings. The ending is even worse in the book. 

Spoiler

Rob/Louise realizes that Adam is a loose end and intends to kill him, saying something like “children are often accident prone”. 

I thought Eve Hewson was the highlight. Excellent acting. Louise was too moronic constantly putting herself in danger. 

I could have done without the astral projection too. I found it more interesting when it seemed to be more of a psychological thriller. 

Edited February 21, 2021 by jenn31

[BlackberryJam]

37 minutes ago, jenn31 said:

Yes, poor Adam (and Adele, as it turns out she was the only good person) but I loved the macabre ending. Tired of everything’s great endings. The ending is even worse in the book. 

  Hide contents

Rob/Louise realizes that Adam is a loose end and intends to kill him, saying something like “children are often accident prone”. 

I thought Eve Hewson was the highlight. Excellent acting. Louise was too moronic constantly putting herself in danger. 

I could have done without the astral projection too. I found it more interesting when it seemed to be more of a psychological thriller. 

I hadn’t even noticed that Adele was played by Bono’s daughter. I found the character pretty trite, but she did it well. I just didn’t enjoy so many scenes of Adele doing/saying the same things.

[ursula]

4 hours ago, topanga said:

Someone please explain the ending to me. Did Rob switch with Adele (and Louise) then kill them because he was in love with David? Or was he simply angry at Adele because she rejected him and at Louise because she betrayed him? 

The former mostly. He wanted Adele’s perfect life, including her perfect relationship with David. He was gay, and never in love with Adele in a romantic way. But he seemed to love her which in his sociopathic way meant he wanted to be her. He did the same to Louise because David was now in love with her.

 

4 hours ago, topanga said:

He didn't notice a change in Louise?

I’m guessing he’ll notice eventually the way he also noticed with “Adele”. 

But it bugs me so much that Rob’s plan relied on so many people being stupid. He literally tells Adele that everyone is out for themselves and she just invites  a heroin addict into her home.

[Happytobehere]

The real victim is little Adam. He sensed immediately that Louise was not the mother he knew and love. There is no way Rob doesn’t at least try to get rid of Adam. He knows the little boy is going to be a problem.

Louise (the actress was fantastic) was a complete idiot who sort of caused her own fate. Aside from befriending the wife of the man she wanted to screw and then began screwing, her actions throughout were stupid. Also, I for one never bought that she wasn’t scheming on David because of the decision to send Adam away with his father. Her son’s absence certainly helped facilitate the affair. Once she saw the truth about “Adelle” she never told Adam how she managed to know things she couldn’t. David tells her that he has to get away and tell the truth before Adelle found out, and Louise responds by running and telling Adelle. Then, she goes to the house rather than call the police or the fire department. You have her texts, that all the proof you need that something is wrong. Big dummy, who met a big dummy end.

Question, before the second reveal ending, I wondered if Adele had killed her parents because they did not approve of David. Knowing the second ending, was the fire that killed her parents, what it seemed to be, an accident. 

[BlackberryJam]

2 hours ago, Happytobehere said:

Question, before the second reveal ending, I wondered if Adele had killed her parents because they did not approve of David. Knowing the second ending, was the fire that killed her parents, what it seemed to be, an accident. 

I thought we were leading to a reveal of either David or Adele setting fire to Adele’s parents house and that’s how we’d figure out the real villain of the piece.

Also, hey David, how about you tell your mistress, “My wife is crazy and broke into the home of a woman I befriended and trashed the place. That’s why you shouldn’t be friends with her.” 

Also, I have a new feeling all the Adele/David sex scenes now.

Edited February 21, 2021 by BlackberryJam

[ursula]

4 hours ago, Happytobehere said:

Question, before the second reveal ending, I wondered if Adele had killed her parents because they did not approve of David. Knowing the second ending, was the fire that killed her parents, what it seemed to be, an accident. 

My theory was this, too. That Adele was the one who started the fire, and she got triggered by anyone who came between her and David. I thought Rob was going to meet David, fall for him or make a pass at him, and this would make Adele kill him. I kept trying to reconcile present-day Adele with the Adele from the flashbacks, so I thought all her niceness and sweetness was either an act or a split personality. The fire was just an accident, after all. But it was relevant because it gave David a record as a former person of interest. So it made sense that he would go along and hide Rob's death because with his watch down the well with the dead body, he won't want to undergo the same scrutiny over again. 

1 hour ago, BlackberryJam said:

Also, hey David, how about you tell your mistress, “My wife is crazy and broke into the home of a woman I befriended and trashed the place. That’s why you shouldn’t be friends with her.” 

So much of this show relied on people not communicating with each other. Obviously, Louise should have told David at once that she had met his wife and was friends with her. Adele asking her to keep this a secret was such a big red flag! Then Real-Adele should have told her fiance about astral projecting. She even literally tells Rob that she doesn't want to ever have secrets from David, yet she keeps such an important part of her away from him and tells a heroin addict that she met in rehab? Real-Adele should have told David that Rob was still using, and just opened her eyes to how problematic her bestie was. On rewatch, it's so clear that David's threats to Louise are for her protection, when he just have just told her the truth of Marianne. See how easy it was for Louise to verify that on her own?! 

It wasn't like Rob was this genius mastermind. It was that he was surrounded by idiots.

[jenn31]

17 hours ago, BlackberryJam said:

I hadn’t even noticed that Adele was played by Bono’s daughter. I found the character pretty trite, but she did it well. I just didn’t enjoy so many scenes of Adele doing/saying the same things.

I think it was to make us aware that it was really Rob in there. She was nothing like the Adele we saw in rehab. Now that we know, it’s clear that it’s Rob’s personality, wardrobe/hair change and all. 

 

[QQQQ]

At some point several eps in, I fell asleep and when I woke up was all, "Astral proje-huh???"

[DanaMB]

Lord have mercy. What did I just watch?

[zibnchy]

Want to echo the sentiment about Simona Brown. She was excellent and I hope to see her in something better soon. In her hands the character of Louise was likable and sympathetic.

That was boring. That was a 3 episode show stuffed into 6 episodes. It went fast though because I quickly realized I could FF thru a lot of boring dreamy/ astral projection nonsense. I'm a little angry that I wasted a few hours watching this turd. But I only have myself and my COVID induced boredom to blame.

If someone is bored and wondering if this is a good show to watch I say "No, go rewatch a few random episodes of Bake Off instead. You'll be much happier."

I'll admit I did not see the astral switcheroo thingy coming. TWICE. So bravo for that writers. Also the character of Adam was well written (and acted). I am not interested in children but I found him engaging.

And finally, can we talk about Sue? Because I want to know her backstory. I'd watch a show that was just about Sue. Are you listening Netflix?

[SHD]

I was sort of disappointed that, as someone said above, it kind of switched genres (to a genre I don’t particularly care for), but I never guessed the ending, so that was good.

I was surprised to see the media highlighting the stories of people saying the ending was homophobic and/or transphobic.

[zibnchy]

I think I was wrong about this show. Because, for some reason, I'm still thinking about it two days later. It was too long. Could have been cut to 4 episodes. Several of the episodes were too long, I kept checking to see how much time was left. That's not a good sign.

But the story was better than I gave it credit for. I know it's very judgey for me to say this but in the hands of better writers this could have been really good. All the action happened in the 6th episode. All that happened in episodes 1-5 was 1.)people dreaming (aka boring) and 2.) people making inexplicably dumb choices (also boring) and 3.) people mooning about (super boring).

I guess we, the audience, were supposed to glean clues from the first 5 episodes. For example, it occurred to me just this morning that Adele (Rob) was grooming Louise all along. All the working out and eating salads was so that Louise's body would be in tip top shape for Adele(Rob). I had assumed that the whole final switcheroo was more of a last minute ploy born of desperation. I don't understand how Adele found out about Louise so fast and targeted her so quickly. Was she projecting into the bar the night David and Louise met?

However I think many watching, including myself, weren't catching the clues because they weren't very well written. Or maybe I'm just a dolt. Anyway, Behind Her Eyes was better than I originally gave it credit for.

[ursula]

1 hour ago, zibnchy said:

I don't understand how Adele found out about Louise so fast and targeted her so quickly. Was she projecting into the bar the night David and Louise met?

Not at the bar, I think, because apparently you can only project into a space you've been before i.e. physically present. However, Adele followed David to work, and Dr. Sharma gave them the whole office tour, so she could project into David's work anytime she wanted to. The first time Louise and David meet in the office, Adele is projecting and watching them. That weird "from ceiling" perspective, and background breathing? That's her. So she hears their conversation about kissing at the bar, can see how David keeps giving Louise puppy dog eyes, and sees Adam's school on the map. She then plans accordingly and "bumps" into Louise.

During their cafe meeting, Adele asks Louise pointed questions about her marital status, and love life, and if there's a new man in her life. Maybe she planned on meeting her, and terrorising her the same way she's apparently been doing to anyone who David gets too close to. But when Louise talks about having night terrors, and sleepwalking, it occurs to Adele that she should play a longer game with Louise. 

12 hours ago, SHD said:

I was surprised to see the media highlighting the stories of people saying the ending was homophobic and/or transphobic.

Isn't it, though? The villain is a gay man in love with a straight man, and steals female bodies to be with him.

Edited February 24, 2021 by ursula

[zibnchy]

Thank you @ursula. That makes so much sense!

I can't speak to transphobia but I thought it was simply ludicrous that Rob, a person with a male body, could just suddenly, in a single day, project into Adele, a person with a female body and not go massively and completely bonkers immediately. I mean it's one thing to suddenly have to pee an entirely different way but what did Rob do the first time Adele's body had a period?!

I have no idea why I am overthinking the heck out of this. I need to get outside more.

Edited February 24, 2021 by zibnchy

[Madding crowd]

1 hour ago, ursula said:

Not at the bar, I think, because apparently you can only project into a space you've been before i.e. physically present. However, Adele followed David to work, and Dr. Sharma gave them the whole office tour, so she could project into David's work anytime she wanted to. The first time Louise and David meet in the office, Adele is projecting and watching them. That weird "from ceiling" perspective, and background breathing? That's her. So she hears their conversation about kissing at the bar, can see how David keeps giving Louise puppy dog eyes, and sees Adam's school on the map. She then plans accordingly and "bumps" into Louise.

During their cafe meeting, Adele asks Louise pointed questions about her marital status, and love life, and if there's a new man in her life. Maybe she planned on meeting her, and terrorising her the same way she's apparently been doing to anyone who David gets too close to. But when Louise talks about having night terrors, and sleepwalking, it occurs to Adele that she should play a longer game with Louise. 

Isn't it, though? The villain is a gay man in love with a straight man, and steals female bodies to be with him.

I don’t think it’s homophobic for a gay person to be a villain. I think it is refreshing to see all kinds of people in all kinds of roles, heroes, villains and everything in between. My biggest issue with the book and the movie is why Rob would exchange the wonderful friendship he had with Adele for a relationship he knew nothing about. And then we are supposed to think David somehow never notices when two different women have complete personality changes. Both Adam and his father knew immediately something was off. And poor Adam.

[sugarbaker design]

I read the book a couple of years ago, and liked it very much.  While Stephen King is my only avenue into the supernatural, I did enjoy the supernatural element.  I am watching the series, really just to see how (and if) they pull it off.  I'm only on episode two and I am enjoying it.  I'm a gay man and I didn't find it homophobic or transphobic, but I can see how some might think so.  In fact, I'd be shocked if no one complained.

[ursula]

2 hours ago, Madding crowd said:

And then we are supposed to think David somehow never notices when two different women have complete personality changes.

David does notice. He repeatedly says things like "I don't know who you are anymore", and "She used to shine once", and "I don't know what happened to the girl I pulled out of the fire." So he knows his wife changed, but he naturally thinks it's a personality change, not that she's literally a different person.

3 hours ago, zibnchy said:

I thought it was simply ludicrous that Rob, a person with a male body, could just suddenly, in a single day, project into Adele, a person with a female body and not go massively and completely bonkers immediately. I mean it's one thing to suddenly have to pee an entirely different way but what did Rob do the first time Adele's body had a period?!

Well it's been 10 years. We can assume he got used to the nuts and bolts. The book touches the subject more.

Spoiler

For example, he aborted Adele's baby (she was pregnant when he killed her in Rob's body), and kept having "miscarriages" because of dysphoria.

 

[BlackberryJam]

And the change occurs not long after she's been hospitalized. 

[ursula]

And maybe he thinks the heroin use Rob introduced her to before he “died” is the reason for her changed behavior. It might even be why he specialized in addiction. 

[Black Knight]

On 2/21/2021 at 9:56 AM, BlackberryJam said:

I thought we were leading to a reveal of either David or Adele setting fire to Adele’s parents house and that’s how we’d figure out the real villain of the piece.

Also, hey David, how about you tell your mistress, “My wife is crazy and broke into the home of a woman I befriended and trashed the place. That’s why you shouldn’t be friends with her.” 

Also, I have a new feeling all the Adele/David sex scenes now.

I don't disagree, but if David's going to be thinking like that, then he should have been thinking something else as well, much sooner:

"My wife somehow knows things that she shouldn't know, and we moved from our last home because she stalked/threatened someone she thought I was having an affair with, so maybe I shouldn't actually have an affair now." I mean, really, even if Rob didn't have the ability to spy through astral projection, David behaved in a way that made it pretty obvious to any spouse paying attention that he was having an affair. But he certainly didn't bother to tell Louise he was putting her in danger by carrying on this affair with her.

11 hours ago, zibnchy said:

I guess we, the audience, were supposed to glean clues from the first 5 episodes. For example, it occurred to me just this morning that Adele (Rob) was grooming Louise all along. All the working out and eating salads was so that Louise's body would be in tip top shape for Adele(Rob). I had assumed that the whole final switcheroo was more of a last minute ploy born of desperation.

That wasn't Rob's original plan. We saw his original plan play out: Befriend Louise, then tip David off that he and Louise were friends, thus making Louise look like a crazy stalker. It worked well enough initially. But then David wanted a divorce, so Rob realized the marriage was unsalvageable and came up with the new plan of stealing Louise's body.

I was pretty annoyed when the astral projection first was revealed, because it seemed unnecessary to me. But when the twist of Rob stealing Adele's body happened, then I did a 180 in my opinion. That was quite thrillingly shocking. Poor Adele. Also, I wonder if it ever bothered Rob that the photo David kept on his desk was of David/Adele back when she was really Adele.

They did a really nice job with the misdirection in regards to what had happened between Rob, Adele and David years ago. Before they actually met, Rob was suspicious of David and protective of Adele, so a natural theory was that David might have killed Rob to prevent Rob exposing him for something nefarious (like killing Adele's parents). Then we learned about "Adele's" behavior with Marianne, and saw how Rob became infatuated with David the moment they met, and got Rob's sister's character testimony that her brother was a total shite. So then it seemed that Rob might have tried something with David and a jealous Adele killed him.

One consideration I found interesting is that because David and Rob met Louise around the same time and they both had to "sneak out" to see her, Rob likely knew Louise just as well as David did. Perhaps even better since Rob had the ability to spy on her with David while David did not have the same ability to spy on Louise at all. So he can probably play-act Louise with David more convincingly and for a longer time than he could play-act Adele with David.

Judging from the look "Louise" shot Adam at the end, he is not long for this world, poor kid. Ironically that will probably be what brings about the ruin of Rob's latest plot to be with David. We learned that what initially turned David away from "Adele" is that he knew "she" didn't have guilt about what happened. There's no way "Louise" would grieve realistically enough over Adam to satisfy David. Rob will want to get back to being happy in the marriage rather than spend a long time pretending to be incredibly sad, devastated, numb, etc.

[Happytobehere]

22 hours ago, SHD said:

 

I was surprised to see the media highlighting the stories of people saying the ending was homophobic and/or transphobic.

That was my immediate thought on the ending, I mean once I got over the DAMN part. There is no way that ending doesn’t play into every transphobes perceptions about transgender people.

[ursula]

4 hours ago, Black Knight said:

That wasn't Rob's original plan. We saw his original plan play out: Befriend Louise, then tip David off that he and Louise were friends, thus making Louise look like a crazy stalker. It worked well enough initially. But then David wanted a divorce, so Rob realized the marriage was unsalvageable and came up with the new plan of stealing Louise's body.

I doubt that Rob taught Louise the ability to astral project without planning to steal her body eventually. Unlike sweet, trusting Adele, Rob is too smart to share that power with someone else, unless he planned to profit from it. 

As Louise told Rob/Adele in the last episode, with his ability to see and know everything, Rob could have stopped the affair at any time. So he let it carry on for a reason. Every-time Louise made progress on her astral projection,  Rob is gratified. 

[ferjy]

18 hours ago, zibnchy said:

However I think many watching, including myself, weren't catching the clues because they weren't very well written. Or maybe I'm just a dolt. Anyway, Behind Her Eyes was better than I originally gave it credit for.

Well I’m not going to say you’re a dolt 😄 (maybe you were just tired!) but I did notice the clues. After the astral projection was introduced, I figured that it must be Rob in Adele’s body. Adele had been down to earth, her clothes were more frilly, her speech relaxed and giggly. New Adele’s speech was more pompous, her clothes tailored, she suddenly liked to cook (that was a big clue for me, Rob liked to cook, and David had mentioned earlier that Adele wasn’t much into cooking). But I thought more that he and Adele had switched and couldn’t switch back, and that she couldn’t go into Rob’s body for whatever reason, and that her soul was flying around waiting for a body to inhabit. I thought Rob/Adele was trying to find a body for her. I still thought Rob was the good guy, he had been so nice to Adele. So the horrible switch and kill with Adele at the well was a surprise to me.

 

Edited February 25, 2021 by ferjy

[zibnchy]

4 hours ago, ferjy said:

Well I’m not going to say you’re a dolt 😄 (maybe you were just tired!)

I was tired! 😀 But the main thing is that I convinced myself very early on that this show was about David being a controlling psycho husband and Adele  an abused/drugged wife who was grooming Louise to take her place in David's life so he would divorce her. So I looked for clues to support my incorrect assumptions. When that became obviously not true I had already missed a lot of clues.

Astral projection never crossed my mind in the early episodes. Because why would it? This is ostensibly a thriller not a scifi thriller. I probably would have liked it better if it had been even more scifi.

[Black Knight]

13 hours ago, ursula said:

I doubt that Rob taught Louise the ability to astral project without planning to steal her body eventually. Unlike sweet, trusting Adele, Rob is too smart to share that power with someone else, unless he planned to profit from it. 

Oh, that is a very good point. On the other hand, though, if that was his plan all along, it seems to me that he could have just stolen Louise's body under similar circumstances as he did Adele's, just by presenting the body-switching to Louise as a fun thing to try together once she learned how to astral project. They were friends, doing fun stuff together, just like him and Adele. There didn't need to be this whole incredibly convoluted plan leading up to making Louise think "Adele" was committing suicide. He's lucky the possibility of going into someone else's body even occurred to Louise. She could have panicked, or just not thought of that possibility. I didn't either when she was at the house - even when she started to astral project, I just thought she was going to see if she could somehow connect with Adele's spirit to wake her up/talk her out of suicide. It was only when she actually went into Adele's body that I realized what she was really trying to do (and realized at that same instant that Rob must have stolen Adele's body years before and this Adele had been Rob all along).

[ursula]

8 hours ago, Black Knight said:

On the other hand, though, if that was his plan all along, it seems to me that he could have just stolen Louise's body under similar circumstances as he did Adele's, just by presenting the body-switching to Louise as a fun thing to try together once she learned how to astral project. They were friends, doing fun stuff together, just like him and Adele. There didn't need to be this whole incredibly convoluted plan leading up to making Louise think "Adele" was committing suicide.

The suicide plan seemed like a reaction to David going to the police about Rob. Rob/Adele didn't anticipate that, and seemed really freaked out about it. It looked slapped together, not planned in advance. It's possible that if that hadn't happened, and she had kept her friendship with Louise, the plan was to do exactly what you described here. Something fun to try. Maybe get Louise stoned the way Adele was when Rob sold the idea to her.

Edited February 26, 2021 by ursula

[Madding crowd]

I don’t think David had too much to worry about with Rob’s  death. He was a known addict who died of an overdose. And as far as David’s watch, Adele wore it and showed to people in the mental hospital, she could even have given it to Rob since David was recovering from burns and couldn’t wear it. I did read the book and it was an important plot point but I don’t think the police would care as much about the death of a criminal addict ( sad as that is).

[Black Knight]

11 hours ago, ursula said:

The suicide plan seemed like a reaction to David going to the police about Rob. Rob/Adele didn't anticipate that, and seemed really freaked out about it. It looked slapped together, not planned in advance. It's possible that if that hadn't happened, and she had kept her friendship with Louise, the plan was to do exactly what you described here. Something fun to try. Maybe get Louise stoned the way Adele was when Rob sold the idea to her.

Also perhaps Rob didn't anticipate that Louise would turn against "Adele" once she astral projected herself, not understanding that Louise would put the pieces together and realize that "Adele" had known who she was from the start. That's what prompted Louise talking to David, which prompted David deciding to go to the police...

All of this above brings me more back to my original thought, that Rob's original plan was simply to end David and Louise's affair by alienating David from Louise, and his idea to junk the marriage and start over with David by stealing Louise's body came much later. David only found out about "Adele" and Louise's friendship because Rob set that up. If Rob's original plan was to steal Louise's body, as another theory goes, he could have just let the status quo (of David having an affair with Louise while she also had a secret friendship with "Adele") continue until Louise successfully astral projected, at which point he could have proceeded with the body-stealing in a similar fashion as when he stole Adele's.

[Mabinogia]

On 2/24/2021 at 3:41 PM, ursula said:

On 2/24/2021 at 12:50 PM, Madding crowd said:

And then we are supposed to think David somehow never notices when two different women have complete personality changes.

David does notice. He repeatedly says things like "I don't know who you are anymore", and "She used to shine once", and "I don't know what happened to the girl I pulled out of the fire." So he knows his wife changed, but he naturally thinks it's a personality change, not that she's literally a different person.

It would have been ridiculous for him to be all "she changed, someone else must have astral-projected into her body" but like you said, he did spend the entire series saying she was different, she changed, she wasn't the woman he fell in love with. He noticed, he just didn't understand why. It seems like he assumed either she was faking being sweet in the beginning or Rob's death changed her. 

A lot of the things that annoyed me along the way actually all made sense once the astral projection and then the body switching were revealed. It was annoying when I though the big shocking reveal was that Adele was your typical over possessive "fatal attraction" type woman controlling poor, sweet David. I didn't find David sympathetic at all. A lot of what happened was his fault for 1) not telling "Adele" to fuck off years ago and 2) not telling Louise that his wife was a dangerous nutcase. But at least at the end it made sense why present Adele was nothing at all like past Adele. 

It was jarring when the show went all in on the supernatural element though there were hints all along, so in that sense I do think it was well crafted. 

And I agree, Simona Brown was the MVP of the series. She made Louise very relatable and real to me. She had great facial reactions. I will watch other things she's in for sure. 

[Black Knight]

EW.com has an article with the director about the twists. It doesn't answer the questions here about whether stealing Louise's body was Rob's plan all along or if it's something he came up with down the road. But I had apparently been distracted in the first couple of episodes and missed the part about how Louise's night terrors were about her mother's suicide.

[peachmangosteen]

8 minutes ago, Black Knight said:

But I had apparently been distracted in the first couple of episodes and missed the part about how Louise's night terrors were about her mother's suicide.

That's what I thought! I'm glad to have confirmation on that because I don't think they really spelled it out in the show. Although maybe they did and I just didn't pay close enough attention lol.

[Mabinogia]

9 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

That's what I thought! I'm glad to have confirmation on that because I don't think they really spelled it out in the show. Although maybe they did and I just didn't pay close enough attention lol.

I kind of assumed it once they connected the spilling pills with the mother laying dead in the bed. Either suicide or accidental overdose. I didn't understand the room with the bubbling walls and why her son was running down the halls but they were nightmares so I don't expect them to make sense. 

[Black Knight]

I think I must have missed the shot of her mother lying dead in the bed, because I don't remember it at all. When watching the show, I thought her original night terrors were just about her fears for her son.

[MaggieG]

My heart broke for little Adam sitting miserably in the back seat. Poor kid. 

When Louise ran to the house and astral projected, I had a feeling that they were going to switch so Adele could have David as Louise. I did not see Rob being Adele all along coming, so I was shocked. Rob as a villain did get extremely lucky. Louise did exactly what he wanted her to do. What if she never showed up at the house? Or what if she did get there, couldn't get in and just decided to wait for the fire department? Would Rob-Adele have gotten up and tried to get out of the house once he realized Louise wasn't astral projecting? He definitely was waiting for her to do that, his aura was hanging out in the corner of the room waiting for Louise's aura to show up.

My husband watched the first episode with me, wasn't really interested so I finished it without him. I told him to watch the last episode!

[sugarbaker design]

46 minutes ago, MaggieG said:

My heart broke for little Adam sitting miserably in the back seat. Poor kid. 

My heart broke for what's eventually going to happen to him.  

[Black Knight]

42 minutes ago, MaggieG said:

Would Rob-Adele have gotten up and tried to get out of the house once he realized Louise wasn't astral projecting?

I don't think he even could have. He had dosed his Adele body with something, just like he'd dosed his Rob body, so that the other woman would be unable to fight back while he murdered her.

I can understand now from the director's commentary that Rob knew Louise would try to save "Adele" because of her mother's suicide as well as guilt over having an affair with David. But expecting Louise to realize she could use astral projection to actually take over "Adele's" body to take it out of the house was a huge leap of faith. After all, the real Adele was an experienced astral projector but had never even thought about body switching until Rob suggested it to her. But Rob was probably just scrambling to improvise at that point. David had made it clear he was done with the marriage, so Rob probably felt like he'd rather die anyway if he couldn't have David anymore. The friendship with Louise had been trashed by then, so getting her to body-switch the way that he got Adele to do it (by presenting it as a fun thing for friends to try together) would no longer have been an option.

[tennisgurl]

Well that sure took a few turns, huh? I assumed this would be a Gone Girl style sexy thriller, did not expect it to turn into a story about astral projection and body swapping. I don't hate it, I actually kind of like when stories take unexpected weird turns, but it did feel like a serious swerve. I don't think this show was very good, but I watched it a few days ago and am still thinking out it, so I guess it did something right. The performances were all great, and that helped to sell me on a lot of the crazy, especially the kid playing Adam. Child actors are often hit or miss, and he did a good job at being a cute kid without being overly precocious or showy. I think that this had potential to be a lot better (maybe the book is?) possibly with some of the weirdness and flashbacks cut out, but I did end up having fun with it and was invested enough that I really wanted to know where it was going. 

I think they could have foreshadowed the twist better, but I do think there were signs, mostly that the young cute Adele we meet in flashbacks seems so different from the icy slightly creepy Adele we meet now. I assumed it was some trauma or breakdown that happened in the in-between time, especially as she just got out of the hospital, but it turns out that its because she is literally a different person. I guess that her fancy polished style came out of Rob really wanting to enjoy being a rich women? There was also the cooking, which Rob liked but Adele apparently didn't, but I first suspected it being Rob when Adele started doing heroin. Even then though I thought Rob being inside Adele was an accident, that they swapped bodies and Adele accidently died in Rob's body, not that Rob talked her into switching and murdered her in cold blood to steal her life. I first thought that either flashback Adele was faking her sweetness or had some kind of second personality, and that maybe she started the fire to murder her parents, but it was really just that she had bad taste in friends. 

I don't think it was intentional on the writers part, but I can see why this twist could be seen as transphobic, its a bit of a fantastical variation on the "trans panic" trope where a straight guy thinks a women is hot then realizes its a trans women and its "hilarious" or "disgusting" just played for drama instead of stupid comedy like it usually is. Again, I don't think this was intentionally transphobic and it doesn't ruin the miniseries for me, and they never make it seem like this is horrible because Adele is a man as much as its Adele isn't Adele, nor do they seem to really connect Rob being evil with him also being gay, but I can definitely see where it raises eyebrows. Its not NOT transphobic. I think they could have done a better job at going into his motives more, murdering his best friend who he very truly seemed to care about to steal her life. At first it seemed like it was more about wanting her life as a beautiful and wealthy heiress engaged to this dreamy guy, but in the current time line it seemed to be more about him being obsessed with David himself, which didn't really seem like his primary motivation originally. 

I mean, becoming a women had to have been a tough adjustment. When Rob as Adele got his first bad cramps, he probably thought a damn alien was going to burst out of his stomach. 

I probably ended up feeling the sorriest for poor little Adam. He will either never know why his mother randomly stopped loving him one day, or he will figure out that something is wrong but will never get anyone to believe him. And the real Adele, who's only crime was being too trusting of the wrong person. 

Edited March 1, 2021 by tennisgurl

[sugarbaker design]

19 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

I think they could have done a better job at going into his motives more, murdering his best friend who he very truly seemed to care about to steal her life. At first it seemed like it was more about wanting her life as a beautiful and wealthy heiress engaged to this dreamy guy, but in the current time line it seemed to be more about him being obsessed with David himself, which didn't really seem like his primary motivation originally. 

In the book it ended with a first person narrative by Rob that explained things.  It was made clear that Rob who initially was friends with Adele, was becoming seriously envious of Adele and had become increasingly obesssive about David.  The writers could've lifted that passage from the book, word for word, to make it clear.  Perhaps, they didn't because in that same passage it became painfully clear that Adam was not safe.

The other problem I had with the TV production was the 6 hour length!  The book was a quick 300 page thriller, no need for 6 hours!

[ursula]

2 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

I think that this had potential to be a lot better (maybe the book is?)

I just finished reading it and I have to say that the book is worse. In the book it was Rob's plan all along to turn Louise against him-Adele, and then stage a suicide that she would astral project to rescue him. He's a puppet master of Machiavellian proportions, anticipating Louise's and David's every move, and turning unexpected occurrences into wins. It's ridiculous.

The show also did a lot to improve on the homophobic and transphobic aspects of the story. Like this:

 

2 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

nor do they seem to really connect Rob being evil with him also being gay

2 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

in the current time line it seemed to be more about him being obsessed with David himself, which didn't really seem like his primary motivation originally. 

Is exactly what the book does. Rob being attracted to men is a "twist", to be revealed in the denouement, inherently linking his orientation to his crime. His motivation is all about David. He admits that he thought he was in love with Adele until he met David and realized what "real love" was. It was not about the money, just David. 

 

 

Edited March 1, 2021 by ursula

[sugarbaker design]

19 minutes ago, ursula said:

Rob being attracted to men is a "twist"

It wasn't overtly said that Rob was gay, but it was certainly intimated that he was, since he was best friends with a gorgeous young woman and never once made a pass at her.  I got a gay vibe from Rob at the very beginning of the book.

[ursula]

56 minutes ago, sugarbaker design said:

It wasn't overtly said that Rob was gay, but it was certainly intimated that he was, since he was best friends with a gorgeous young woman and never once made a pass at her.  I got a gay vibe from Rob at the very beginning of the book.

Apart from the fact that not every heterosexual man would automatically hit on his attractive female friend, that could mean that Rob is asexual. It's not like the show where Rob's attraction to men was defined early and explicitly, and Rob is openly gay. The book revealed this as a "Gotcha!"

Edited March 1, 2021 by ursula

[sugarbaker design]

14 minutes ago, ursula said:

It's not like the show where Rob's attraction to men was defined early and explicitly, and Rob is openly gay.

This is where we totally agree.

14 minutes ago, ursula said:

The book revealed this as a "Gotcha!"

And this is where we don't agree.  And that's ok.

[snickers]

I watched this last week, I heard it had a "WTF" twist so I figured I had to watch.....

My thoughts:

1. While I was surprised that "Adele" was "Rob", the signs were there, I knew the minute they showed the astral projecting that Rob was not dead, but I wasn't sure who he was.....at one point I thought Rob was David! I also thought maybe the Adele was finding a way to reunite with Rob somehow, I was all kinds of confused....but I was not expecting Rob to be Adele

2.  I figured there had to be some reason Adele gave Louise the journal and there was a reason she wanted her to learn to astral project

3. Just for Adam! He the true victim here as others have said!!!!!! I was very unhappy when I saw at the end where that was going....

4. The twist was just an okay twist it definitely was over-hyped and I felt there was a more shocking twist in Harry Potter book 3 than this!

[Madding crowd]

7 hours ago, ursula said:

Apart from the fact that not every heterosexual man would automatically hit on his attractive female friend, that could mean that Rob is asexual. It's not like the show where Rob's attraction to men was defined early and explicitly, and Rob is openly gay. The book revealed this as a "Gotcha!"

Rob’s being into men was defined in the flashback at the hospital when he told the nurse “ I’m into big throbbing cock”.