User Reviews

At first I thought there was a huge plot hole - Ryan said he returned the gun that night, but Mr. Carroll said it was missing for a few days. Upon reviewing the scene between Mare and Mr. Carroll, he says he heard a noise that night (apparently after Ryan took the gun) and checked - the gun was missing. But then he says it was a few days later that he discovered it was back. That's consistent with Ryan returning it that night, but Mr. Carroll didn't know about Ryan's second visit that night. Not a plot hole!

Good series overall, lots of layers to reveal - done well.

♠♠♠♠ WOW!!! (IN CAPITAL LETTERS) AMAZING FINALE EPISODE!

WONDERFUL PERFORMANCES!

INCREDIBLE FINAL TWIST!

I HAVE NO MORE TO SAY.... {JULIANNE NICHOLSON DESERVES AN EMMY (AND KATE AS WELL,OF COURSE)} THE ONLY THING I AM SORRY IS BECAUSE...IT ENDED ♠♠♠♠

♣ ♣ ♣ ♣

Regards from Argentina.

♣ ♣ ♣ ♣

You get an answer on who the killer was in an episode before then they totally throw in a twist at the opening of the episode! That's not it though!! With about 20 minutes left in the show the writers throw a curveball and totally fool everyone! I never would of guessed it was who it was and the drama of it unfolding was just about perfect! All in all the season was amazing, Kate Winslet I feel like is made for this character and the ending couldn't of been any better! I know it's a mini series but I hope to see them in a new season!!

Yes, this was a who done it with lots of red herrings so you should have figured it out and seen the reveal itself become just another red herring but the true genius here was the levity brought in by Jean Smart. I just adored her character. The acting by Evan Peters, Kate and Julianne was superb. Even the actress who played Erin just struck at my heart. This series was just as much about the secondary characters as was the murder mystery. Well done.

OK, ex policeman stores loaded gun in his garden shed, rather than in the attic, so that his grandchildren don't play with it. Not very safe, or secure, despite the padlock on the shed door, but OK.

Increasingly confused on a day-to-day basis, but (if I recall correctly) not yet bereaved, he hears a prowler one night, goes out to the shed and notices that his treasured police issue gun is missing. But he doesn't report it to the police!!! We are starting to stretch credibility now.

After an undisclosed amount of time, for some reason, when looking for tools in the shed, he opens the wooden case in which his missing gun was previously stored. Why?

Miraculously he finds that the gun has been returned, but it has two bullets missing. Although he and his late wife reported prowlers to the police, a former police officer doesn't think this discovery is worth reporting to the police, despite there being an unsolved murder in a small PA town. He really must be confused.

Whilst all this helps to maintain the integrity of the plot, it's just a little too convenient a way to introduce the final twist in what has otherwise been an excellent series.

But Kate Winslet deserves every acting award she picks up for her master class in character portrayal.

When I watched the *absolutely* shocking ending of Episode 5 of Mare of Easttown, I thought I had stumbled across HBO's latest one-hit-wonder in the vein of True Detective Season 1. The emotional twists and turns in the subsequent Episode 6 debatably hit me even harder and set up arcs that I didn't even see coming. Mare's acceptance of Carrie taking a serious shot at being a mom and essentially giving her the chance that she never got with Kevin was an emotional turning point that I completely welcomed. It felt like a huge opportunity for growth that was unexpectedly being taken. The episode then ended on one of the most heavily paced and intense cliffhangers I've seen in recent memory. I was hooked and ready to go.

After watching Sacrament, I couldn't help but feel like the show just fell short. Before anything, I just want to state that I'd give the show as a whole a solid 8/10, which easily could have been a 9/10 or higher with a different finale. The show in its entirety really dived in on the extremely dark and heavy themes of human weakness and psyche, sociopathy, motherhood, manipulation and subterfuge. Yes there were light-hearted moments of course, but the light-hearted moments really felt like moments of comic relief or glimmers of light in an otherwise bleak world. This show was undeniably DARK, and it seemed to have a solid understanding of that.

The finale of Mare of Easttown seems to forget its own themes and takes a turn for the light. However, the unforeseen consequence is that this turn for the light now creates a plethora of plot holes and issues that really open discussion to false character development and further inconsistencies disguised by "acceptance". A lot of arcs that have been set up have now been completely abandoned. Starting with:

• Siobhan's documentary?? Anne?? I mean, Siobhan's character just basically amounts to almost nothing by the end of the show. There is no closure for her, and her closure seemed to be one of the most important arcs looming over everything. Just because she leaves solves nothing. What about her demons?

• Poor, poor Deacon Mark. Again, with the dark and heavy themes of Easttown suddenly being redeemed towards the light, you'd expect Deacon Mark to have at least some kind of closure as well in terms of his accusations at the parish? Nothing. Mare just apologizes on the town's behalf for "wronging" him. How do they even know he can be trusted still? He still obstructed justice, hid evidence, lied to authorities and potentially had an inappropriate relationship with Erin. And if he WAS innocent, he literally just got his life messed up yet again for no good reason at all.

• Why did Dylan stick the gun in Jess' face and threaten her with death? Dylan wanting to conceal the identity of the true father seems to be a far-fetched reason for this kind of behaviour, especially for him to suddenly come up and become a "good guy" out of nowhere in the finale. By giving Lori the money that he stole from Erin, he's suddenly redeemed? How did he even come to this conclusion? He just felt bad? And what of his shoddy alibi and his insane sketchiness towards Brianna? Again, nothing?

• Where is any mention of Zabel? The finale seems to be an episode about acceptance. Not even a quick funeral scene for him? He was without a doubt a humongous part of the show. It seems like the writers had completely forgotten about the lasting effects of his death.

• Carrie just suddenly fails as a mother again and relapses and Mare gets to keep Drew again? Wut? What on earth was the point of Mare accepting losing Drew to Carrie? So basically, nobody grows in this show except Mare? Everybody else just has a poop life while Mare wins?

• The ferret kid? Was it really just Ryan? If it wasn't Ryan, why did the ferret kid even matter? They said he worked in the garden in the summer, that's all they was needed. They flashed the drawing an awful lot throughout the show. Why. It literally lead nowhere.

• Why did Guy Pearce even leave? If his character truly was unsuspicious the entire time and was there only to serve Mare's character and arc, then why not just keep him in...? Seemed pointless to have him go right after basically confirming that it wasn't him to the audience.

• Why did they decide to go with John / Ryan as the ones responsible? It honestly just felt cheap. The entirety of the show, I was thinking that it couldn't have been them because of their blatant absence from the show in general. I thought "if it ends up being John or Ryan then I won't even care because they're so irrelevant". And that's exactly how I felt when it was revealed. Wouldn't it have been 20x more shocking to have been somebody like Lori manipulating John or Ryan? She had already manipulated Mare and was literally right under our noses the entire time. Mare was in full trust of her and even leaned her head on her shoulder in comfort in the previous episode. It felt like a wasted twist that could have been way better.

• Seriously, what was up with Lori? Again, the show seemed to really capitalize on each character's weakness throughout the show. Lori turned out to be a massive liar and manipulator towards the ending of Episode 6. Suddenly, she's just innocent at the finale? Not even a charge for obstruction of justice? Why did she act so sociopathic along with Ryan during the interview scene when they clearly show remorse for their actions when alone? A lot of inconsistencies in acting or writing or both?

It felt like Mare just gave up being detective towards the end and decided to understand as a mother. Which is heartfelt and all, but when you're a detective you're supposed to do your job. Lori wasn't even questioned. In what world of law would that ever happen? Again, this was supposed to be a show that really dives into the human psyche. In the finale, it failed to dive into mine long enough to leave a lasting impression.

• DJ is just going to proceed to live with Lori? JOHN SEXUALLY MOLESTED HIS MOM AND RYAN MURDERED HER. Who in the right mind approved of this idea?! The circulated online "Kevin being the father" idea literally would have been better, seeing as how the baby randomly has red hair and that DJ's birthday being 9 months away from Kevin's death meant nothing? Also that would have wrapped up both Mare and Carrie's arc perfectly? Because each of them would have a son of Kevin's? How does Lori even legally get to keep the baby DJ??? This might just be the biggest oof (besides the next one).

And last but not least...

• How on earth did RYAN, the emotionally reckless CHILD who beat a kid with a lunch tray in front of everybody with no care for getting caught, suddenly develop the multi-faceted Ted Bundy-like brain in order to drag her body like Agent 47, call his dad to act as clean-up crew, bike back to Old Man Carroll's and drop the gun back off?

It's nonsensical to try to believe that Ryan's first instinct after shooting Erin would NOT be to drop the gun in a panic, thus leaving it in the park and running off. Then having perhaps having an hour or two of panicking / contemplation before finally mustering up the 13-year-old courage to call his dad and tell him what really happened. Wouldn't that sound more realistic?

During the entire explanation of Ryan's flashback, I was in a state of disbelief, thinking that it was so unbelievable that the writers were planning a third twist or explanation. They did not. That was what we got.

The show ended on a surprisingly "wholesome" note and I'm just not sure that it was for the better based on the themes this show has introduced to us. The threat of Easttown is still very much alive. Just because Mare grows throughout the show means nothing in actuality. True Detective Season 1 was completely aware of the massive, looming evil that hung over it even down to its final minute. The 'acceptance' is accepting that the dark is equally as prevalent as the light, not ignoring it entirely.

This show introduced to us one of the seediest little towns we have ever seen in an HBO series. The entire equation of the town is left unsolved which I believe is the biggest misfortune of the show hands down. I thought the first episode's message was extremely clear. It wasn't Ryan that killed Erin. It was the TOWN (Mare included).

Mare of Easttown took the aforementioned 'light-heartedness' and solidified it into the finale which swerved the show's steering wheel into the family drama territory. Unfortunately, the result honestly felt like taking a bite of True Detective Season 1 but somehow you were left with the strange aftertaste of Golden Girls. Not sure if I would rewatch due to the finale. It certainly wasn't a Game of Thrones but I must express my disappointment in HBO once again. To simply "level up" and wrap up the titular character is just not satisfying enough of a show ending for me.

TL;DR: SHOW 8/10 FINALE 5/10.

Oh boy, it's crazy that so many people in the series hiding something or giving only part of statement at the beginning only to say that "Here's what I've been hiding from you" at the end.

The case would've been solved by the second episode if everyone was truthful.

Dylan suddenly becomes the good guy in the finale when he shoved a gun to someone's head in the earlier episode to make us think that he's the killer. He even tried so hard to 'be the killer' when he's not (saying something like how Erin got shot in the head).

Colin Zabel lived and died for nothing. There's no impact at all to the series and to the protagonist.

The detective part, or the lack of it, was disappointing. The case is solved by pure luck, as the protagonist says, "Something people expect much when in reality, you're just screwed up as they are."

Main question is ..... this is set in America .... majority of people own guns so why would Mare not own her own gun and carry it when going on the calls her and Colin were making at end of Ep 8?.

Now that we know the ending ...... Billy saying he was going to confess made totally no sense at all and the episode at river for me was for drama. Too much filler. Again Mare going it again on her own without backup makes you wonder how she hasn't been killed years ago.

Guy's character I think was to show there was a possible future for love in her going forward, a need for a relationship that she can now think about.

I was really hoping that Mare and Helen would welcome Carrie into their home before they made her into a user again.

With all the above said ....... it really doesn't matter ...IT WAS AN AWESOME SERIES and it kept us going for 7 weeks. Agree with so many ... award nominations for Winslet and Nicolson and for the writers and show in whole. THANKS TO ALL FOR THIS GREAT SHOW.

The series was enjoyable. Kate has begun a series of characters that reminds me of Streep. The main suspense sequence in episode 5 so closely mimicked silence of the lambs, my wife and I both thought there might be moths flying. Glad she got the gun while the captives didn't scream. Yet, trying to guess the main shooter was tough, so I guess they succeeded in keeping us going through the last episode. Julianne Nicholson is a wonderful actress and she should be lauded for her performance. So, it was a fun, but tough watch. Guy Pierce, originally thought in early episodes as a drifter-maybe the killer, turned to be a nice guy. Thanks. Thought Mare might take Kevin's addict girlfriend into Siobhan's room, but she climbed the attic stairs. Better ending.

Feels like that was thrown in there just to throw us off?

Nonetheless very good!

So the acting and the story and the end of the series, as a TV show, is great. It closes things off and does pay off for the viewers who just want to watch the end of the story and get closure on the series.

But, OMG, is it a mess of holes.

Nevermind the gun timeline that has been pointed out by several other commenters:

Ex-cop loses his gun but doesn't report it... John Ross who is in jail for murder, is not guilty of murder, would be re-tried for perverting the course of justice, probably released having served >8 months... Billy Ross is only guilty of perverting the course of justice, probably released by >8 months... Lori Ross would be arrested and charged with perverting the course of justice, whatever revised sentence John Ross gets she would get the same (or similar)... The daughter and DJ would certainly not be staying with her, especially DJ who she has no real familial connection to: he is the child of her convicted murderer husband and the original murder victim, CFS are definitely taking him away to foster care...

I really was into this series, but the finally was very contrived, and underwhelming, and very predictable, IMO. The actors save the writing which is great in some parts but extremely mediocre, if not flat out bad in others. Closing a series seems to be really difficult for show writers these days, considering how many are very good, even great until it comes to writing a satisfying ending. It really makes you appreciate just how good a show like breaking bad actually was, or the wire, not every show can end legendary I get it, but not most shows need to end so damn underwhelming, either. Cough*game of thrones* overall this series was worth a watch for the great acting performances, just don't think too deep into it afterwards or you'll likely get annoyed.