Mare of Easttown: The perfect balance of drama and thriller

There was a lot of excitement around Kate Winslet-starrer miniseries Mare of Easttown when it was being aired, and once I started watching, I understood why. It was the TV series version of a page turner. And boy, did I binge watch! I rarely ever watch thriller shows or movies, but I stayed up and finished this miniseries in one night, no matter how tightly I had to wrap my blanket around me.

The show, set in a small town, grabs the viewer’s eye right from the first few frames – all showing the small town in a dark, stormy setting. A story set in a small town promises drama and the calm-before-the-storm outlook brings in the added aspect of thriller, and just like that, two different genres are combined to hold on to two kinds of audiences.

As the mystery of a murder and a disappearance in the show unravels, so do the reasons behind why the miniseries became “the talk of the town”.

Kate’s character is called Mare, which effectively makes for a very apt wordplay in the title, as she tries to help everyone around her, even if it does not seem that way to others.

Mare is a Detective Sergeant and she can be shrewd sometimes for no reason. However, as the story tracks the life of a policewoman, especially in a town so small and so knit together personally and professionally, it becomes clearer why dissociation is not a choice but a necessity for her when investigations cause her to question her family and friends ruthlessly. It brings us face-to-face with the reality of how tough the lives of police personnel in such towns can be, where if they get ruthless in questioning, their personal lives are thrown in their faces again and again by defensive and scared townsfolk.

As the story proceeds, the many crossroads that Mare finds herself at make one ponder about the course they themselves would choose, and I guess, to me, that is the beauty of the show.

What makes it harder is a personal life that is falling apart, especially as she continues to not show emotions – having internalised a need to always be the person solving everything.

Another aspect that is capturing is the different ways in which people deal with grief. Murders, disappearances, suicides, extra-marital affairs, drug abuse – the town sees it all. But it also sees the ways in which families try to overcome the grief, and the extent to which mothers go to keep their children safe and happy. It is realistic, and the character progression makes more sense than a happy-ever-after that usually comes at the end of most stories, and I think, at the end of the day, it is this realism that managed to keep my attention. It worked well to amplify and display the side effects of some situations that people never or rarely consider.

Unexpected twists kept me engaged and as the 7-episode miniseries came to an end, I couldn’t find many loose ends in the story.

In conclusion, since I do not believe in ratings and stars, I’ll definitely recommend this series to anyone looking for a thrilling watch.