User Reviews

This miniseries is well worth watching provided one does not expect the show to follow logical dramatic paths. The ending is what will disappoint most except for a few, I would imagine. There is no doubt that the ending is appropriate. There is no doubt that the meandering threads of the story that each lead to disappointment are equally appropriate. The problem with this series is in the deliberate arrangement of the threads by backing up and going forward in time. This leads to the inevitable conclusion by the viewer that the writer/director is in weaving the story and knows the ending of the story. To then cede control of the story to an UNEXPLAINED (as opposed to unknown) fate is not very good story telling. So, for the lack of an appropriate ending (3 seconds of dirt falling on the camera would have not been too much to ask) the story is all but lost and the viewer is left to contemplate the plot line rather than the tragic lack of closure that is often the fate of parents of missing children. So while it was a good series, it wasn't. It was 3 seconds short.

This mini series was an absolute travesty of intelligence - if I knew there was no ending I would not have watched Amber. It was painful watching all the mistakes but I continued to watch to see how it would end, alas that didn't happen. Real life does have endings even if it's a file being closed to say "unresolved" but we didn't even get that. I'm sorry, but my recommendation is not to watch this mini series. My score for it is 3/10 and the only reason it got 3 was because of the actors. As for the play itself, zero... Does this review contain spoilers, YES, and rightfully so....

This type of drama is often looked forward to. Considering its connections to reality and the many missing children I was very interested in the story line. The first episode laid a good plot making the desire to see following episodes very high. It was a little annoying to be often taken back to previous days to add more information rather than keep things in the correct order but the story still kept our interest and attempts to work out the who and how of the plot The finale was just about as disappointing as it could be, so much so, we replayed part of the last episode to work out what we had missed. Unfortunately we had not missed anything it was just as it appeared, with no fault to cast or acting, a very disappointing ending.

Excellent TV series about a girl gone missing. Unfortunately, the fourth episode left us hanging worse than most season finales. I hope there will be a second season so the story has some closure. If they wait too long to add episodes the interest in following it will be long gone. This is as good a time as any for me to comment about TV series that go on endlessly...I encourage producers to do seasonal series that start and end in same season. Worse season break was Breaking Bad, which cut the final season in half and left us waiting nearly a year for the final half of the last season. I loved that show but waiting for the final half of the last season has taken a lot of the enjoyment out of it and I've almost completely lost all interest.

Among the reviews there seems to be a debate. Some say the ending was frustrating for being open-ended. Others say that it was reflective of real life - too often the parents of missing children never know and the story revolves around the trials of the family.

Those who are frustrated are right, the apologists wrong, and here's why.

Throughout the series we are given glimpses of the first few hours after Amber's disappearance. Some of those glimpses are unknown to any of the characters in the series and will never be known. They turn out to be inconsequential, but nevertheless point of view is everything. We have revealed to us repeatedly things the characters do not know as we watch Amber walk away from her friend's house, travel into town, go to a shop, catch the train back, find her phone is stolen, miss her stop, get out at the next one and begin her walk home.

Most importantly, these are all presented at the end of each episode building up the 'So what really happened?' suspense.

You simply cannot allow yourself the point of view of an effective narrator who knows it all and then not tell us. You cannot use the techniques designed to lead people deeper into the series seeking resolution and then say 'Oh, it was never about that'. Both these aspects are cheating. The second is a con. The first is a fundamental narrative flaw because it doesn't say 'We don't know', it says 'We know but we're not telling you.' That reduces the whole thing to a dog story.

Add to that the fact the entire episode with the phone was inconsequential - a quarter of the entire series - and didn't even give us sufficient development in the main characters to justify it.

It wouldn't have taken much for the writers et al. to either bring closure, or to stick to the narrative techniques whereby it's clear that no closure may indeed be the outcome. But to tell us, in effect, that there will be a resolution and then not to provide it is sloppy if not downright shoddy.

Excellent, well acted drama out of Ireland. Reminded me of the series "The Killing" here in the States. The focus of the story is the missing girl, Amber, and gives viewers several points of view on the event. Story is a bit disjointed at times but that can be overlooked. I do wish the finale was a bit more final since a second season is not guaranteed. I've searched for additional details on the net to help me solve the mystery on my own. It's good enough to where I will wind up watching it a second time. I do hope this series gains enough viewer ship and attention so that a second season is warranted. Please give us a second season and closure!

I say end because that's it! boom end. I remember being on the 3rd episode and thinking this is a lot of filler. Keep going back to day 1 and showing the exact same scene with like an added 20 second thing that happened that day. Over and over. I'm sorry but I cracked up when the dad walks into the police and says he's going to pose as a pedo online. The way he says it , how the partners computer gets taken with all his accounts in it. Most entertaining thing in the whole 6 hours. This should be called " Amber walking" all the time. The acting was good but all and all it was a disjointed but of stuff. I knew when their was so much filler it wasn't going to end well. That's what writers do when they don't really have ny material. I never dreamed it would end like that tho. Even if it gave us something I would have rated it at least a 7 probably but can't the way it is.

Started watching, not knowing how many episodes there would be. First episode very promising, with a hide-the-plot structure that lets us know that SOMETHING happened on day one, and we will get teasing flashbacks slowing filling this in as the story progresses. By episode three it becomes clear that this series could go on indefinitely, showing how various people far and wide were affected by the girl's disappearance. Hmmm, I think, I hope this is not one of those 10-episode series, because this could become rather repetitive, just getting teased with a tiny new detail each week while the story rambles near and far. Then comes episode four, which appeared to be the last one. Hmmm, after setting up a recurring story machine, now they are cutting it short. Ah well, at least we'll see what happened to Amber. But no, the story simply ends, with no resolution at all. Now I realize this is how things often go in life--we get no answer--but this is a story, and stories have a beginning, middle, and end. (Please read your Aristotle, script-writers.) So while Amber pretends to imitate life, it does so with all the trappings of a certain genre of storytelling, and disappoints either as philosophical discourse (it's way too shallow for that) and as TV thriller (it's a total bust). Once again, I have let the Beeb waste 4 hours of my life. I'm just thankful the series was not longer.

Major spoiler - if you haven't seen this program, don't read!

I too was hoping that in the end we would find out what really happened to Amber. The ending was a huge letdown, that's true, but I think that's the whole point of the series. In reality, so many of these missing children are never found, and I think the purpose of the ending was to make us feel just a little of that bitter, frustrated feeling that the parents must live with every day of their lives. We are so used to movies and TV shows that solve mysteries in tidy little half- hours or two hours, when in reality too many cases are like Amber's.

It kept me on the edge of my seat.

I wish I had read these reviews before wasting a perfectly good Friday night with my husband only to be left with depressed horrid feeling of nothingness ! Iwe were hooked with episode one, couldn't wait to start the second by the third we were concerned how they just kept on and on. Middle of the fourth we were both just constantly going over and over areas in episode to see if we missed s0mething. My husband in disbelief watched the last ten minutes three times just KNOWING we missed something . Then last three minutes two more times.. Omg.. Seriously? He had me google to see when the rest of the seasons or episodes would be airing. Or if, like several we watched , had to buy the last season.. But I see there is nothing else. Friday night gone. Smh

The ending that was not an ending ruined the series for me. I am not saying that I only enjoy series when all loose ends are neatly tied off. I have seen many series where the villain won or where there were a few hanging threads. This one just abruptly ended. The description of the show says something like "What happened to Amber?" implying to me at least that we would come close to an answer. I guess I could understand if at the end there was some public service announcement about how many missing children cases go unresolved leaving the families lost in their fears and unanswered questions. However, not even that happened to let us know this is the end of the series. The acting was great. Just the end could be better.

"Amber" pulls it from under our feet and shocks us because it doesn't give easy answers, and it's relentless. As I read previous entries here, I sense a wave of disappointment after disappointment because we always want to know everything, expect clean, tidy resolutions. There are tons of TV shows delivering that already. "Amber" takes some daring steps and ruffles a few feathers.

The story might not be anything new. A young teen disappears, and the clues are pointing to an early discovery. After all, there's no real big mystery when we start. Friends are interrogated, technology seems to be providing information very quickly, but luck soon interferes. Then the trail grows cold, and lives are permanently altered.

Set in Ireland, things could look a bit different, but they are similar to anything you'd expect in other parts of the world, and by the end of the series, we can see that "Amber" has grown into something more complex, and the mystery remains, maybe even more puzzling than ever. Through the four episodes, we met plenty of possible suspects, and this what irks many. Some are cleared, other remain question marks. It looks like the writers have done this intentionally, so there shouldn't be that much ill will for the resolution. Not sure if this is the true conclusion of the series, or if we will be treated to another season. It is set up to go either way. Sometimes we don't get all the answers, but sometimes we get writing that challenges us and takes into a powerful ride.

Good concept with no ending which totally ruins it.

After the second episode I was getting annoyed at just repetition of the story. You see how each element of the first episode expands into the other episodes but the story never moves and it's just about the same search over and over that never resolves itself. The show's co-creator, after the uproar at the lousy ending does share that she's dead by drowning but how or why is not even mentioned.

Which brings us back to the last episode and towards the end Dad's taking pictures of a new suspect; the guy on the beach with his dog. We are to wonder if that was a "possible" killer who supposedly drowned her (the fliers in the water was the writer's "clue" to the viewer according to the co-creator) but at this point I could care less and of course it never went anywhere because fortunately this was almost over

The plot had really cheesy "possible" suspects which now just looks like weak writing afterwards.

Honestly the concept of different perspectives sounded great but the weak writing and the unresolved ending that one spent 4 episodes to wrap up with at the end but didn't work as it kept you waiting (and not giving up) and turning the channel until you found out nothing. I so wish I could swear right now but that would not be very appropriate. Avoid avoid avoid!!!!!!!

Spoiler alert: There is no ending. Every previously used missing child red herring--including the other child's resentment, the parents splitting up, human trafficing, missing cell phones, false alarms, friends of victim keeping secrets, alienation of parents' friends.....four hours of it and they never explain what happens to Amber. We don't even get to know if she is dead or alive.

The last scene has her walking down a country road, passed a parked car. A white van pulls off the road and a guy gets out and tranfers some stuff from the back to the front. He then drives off, passing Amber walking and disappears out of sight. Amber keeps walking away from the camera, down a country road in broad daylight. Then the credits.

Done. Over. I couldn't believe it.

So the assumption is that Amber was abducted by the parked car, the white van or someone else entirely. She was either murdered or is being held captive somewhere. No ending.

Even the actors had to wonder who was going to buy this ending?

Lately, because of blatant politicizing of most U.S.-based drama as of late, I have been looking for dramas from around the world. When I stumbled across Amber, I thought I hit gold. As a rule, I don't read reviews of shows because I don't want to inadvertently read about any spoilers. It was a captivating take on asynchronous method of storytelling, with each episode encompassing an arc of the many months involving the action of the activities of the family of a missing teen girl. Coincidentally named the same as the AMBER alert in the United States, this show was very well done, with each episode resulting in a closure of other missing girls, though not of the main protagonist.

Unfortunately, this series ended on an abrupt note. The disposition of the main protagonist girl, Amber, was never resolved. When I read the reviews, it seemed the overwhelming complaint was the lack of resolution. The writer and the main star both proclaimed this to be the intent of the production, as "real life doesn't always end in happy endings."

Endings don't have to end in happy resolutions, and in fact COULD intentionally end up open-ended as Amber did, but the METHOD in doing so should not be at the expense of the viewer's expectations. One watches shows and dramas expecting resolutions, either bad or good, sad or happy, and in some cases, unknowing but with a strong sense of characters either moving on or succumbing to the pain or emotions. In fact, real life DOES bring about many circumstances that don't have resolutions, but the main function of a show is to provide a dramatical ending.

(Quantum Leap was another show that had a disappointing ending, but at least there was clarity of what happened at the end, unlike Amber.)

My own take was that this was a show that should have demanded a second series. The point was they had a very captivating drama, engaging actor chemistry, and wonderful execution of the scripting and asynchronicity of the plot. I felt they had enough plot to last at least 4 more episode, perhaps 6 more to give it a proper 10-episode arc, and enough to engage some sort of ending. And while we can have solace to a degree that several other girls who were murdered or trafficked had resolutions to their own issues, shirking the main protagonist does more to annoy me than to sadden, anger, humor, or cheer me, each of which should really be the goal of every telestory.

I hope a reboot of this show is done, but with a more sustained plot and resolution at the end.