Quick Review of Pieces of Her
A drama-thriller based on the Karin Slaughter novel of the same name, Netflix’s Pieces of Her was a decent weekend binge.
Andrea Oliver (Bella Heathcote) is celebrating her 30th birthday with her mother, Laura (Toni Collette) at a local diner when a shooter opens fire, killing two women. Laura, attempting to ward off the shooter from killing her daughter, winds up saving the day by slitting the shooter’s throat with the very blade that he stuck through her hand! Laura warns her daughter not to talk to the police and thus starts Laura down the rabbit hole of finding out the truth about her mother’s past.
Immediately I was reminded of 2005’s A History of Violence, a similar concept about a family man and restaurant owner who lives in a small town; one night he encounters robbers and the result of taking them out, puts him on the news. Shortly after his heroics, he is visited by a mobster claiming to recognize him as a former professional hitman for the mob.
Many of the reveals of Pieces of Her, are pretty far-fetched, but I found the suspense and plot to keep me interested, especially in the early half of the series. The issue; there are so many reveals that the entire show becomes a bit convoluted. One might compare Pieces of Her to a Lifetime movie, but I’ve honestly never seen one.
Pieces of Her Gets a 3 out of 5.
With decent suspense, characters, and acting, Pieces of Her had enough there for me to enjoy my time with the series, even though that required looking past Bella Heathcote’s terrible American accent and some pacing issues on the back end of the series (flashback sequences overstay their welcome). I’m sure the book is better, and this could have probably just been a movie, but if you are looking for a show to stream, you could do a lot worse than Pieces of Her.
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