Saint X

An upper middle class family goes on vacation to a Caribbean island resort - Mom (Betsy Brandt), Dad (Michael Park), 19 year old Alison (West Duchovny), a confident, opinionated, and flirty Ivy League student, and anxious, shy 7 year old Claire (Kenlee Anaya Townsend). On the last night of the trip Alison disappears and is later found dead. Two resort workers and childhood friends Edwin (Jayden Elijah) and Clive (Josh Bonzie) are suspected to have killed her but never charged. 20 years later Claire, now going by Emily (Alycia Debnam-Carey) is living in New York and has finally gotten her life together after suffering a mental breakdown two years prior, when a chance encounter sends her on a treacherous quest for answers about her sister's death.

The story is told in two intertwining timelines. We watch Alison and family on their vacation, day by day, and as they draw closer to that fateful last night, present day Emily/Claire is unraveling as she gets closer and closer to the answers. Additional flashbacks to the aftermath of the tragedy and to Edwin and Clive's childhood provide some explanations and backstory with potential clues. The placement of the flashbacks seems random, but I actually liked it that way. They felt organic. The filmmakers' intent was never obvious. Clues came in subtly and unexpectedly, and it was impossible to tell what was a clue and what wasn't. And the final resolution turned out to be something completely unexpected. There was a bit of a hole in the last piece in the chain of events leading to Alison's death, but the rest of the chain was so great, so surprising, it didn't really bother me. Even the epilogue was full of unexpected turns.

I have to say, I usually can't help noticing holes in just about everything I watch. I didn't notice any here, aside from that one part.

Added bonus. It's more than just a thriller. It's a story about the toll it takes to pretend to be someone you're not.

Overall decent, although it did lack in excitement. The worst thing about the series is the way it flashed back all the way to when Clive was a young child in elementary school. I just couldn't get into that part of the show. The flashbacks to when Claire was younger and her memory of the resort and when her sister was killed, is interesting but too much time was spent on the Clive flashbacks. Hope season 2 leaves that out.

Also, the music played in the background to try to make certain scenes seem more mysterious, was used way too much. The simplest conversation would be happening, and that slow music would be played to up the excitement, but it only made the scenes stand out as boring.

I just don't get how this is a 5.4 rating currently. Of course everyone is entitled to their opinion but IMO this show is a solid 7.5 so far so i'm giving it an 8/10.

The cast is good, some better than others, and the story is interesting enough for you to keep wanting to watch the next episode. It's far from perfect, I think the editing could be improved it's too jumpy for my liking tho I do like the various timeline approach.

Not sure if it's going to be dragged out a bit too long will have to wait and see, but so far am enjoying it. Give it a go, if you are into true crime documentaries/shows then this will hook you, either way it's one of the better new series out there right now.

Update: After 2 more episodes what I feared is becoming true .....it's starting to drag and I'm losing interest all the storylines involved now although initially interesting don't have enough weight to be dragged out, i just want to know how this ends now, downgrading by a point.

The bad reviews out there are par for the course. But some of them don't even make sense. Like comparing it to White Lotus. (Because they're at tropical resorts, these 2 shows in totally different genres are worth comparison, lol.) Or people complaining about flashbacks every 3 minutes. (There are some flashbacks, but not many. Those people must be confused by the story progressing along different timelines.)

Most of the negative reviews are likely either boomers who think all tropical nations (and people) are the same, or Gen-Z who can't follow a storyline that's more complex than a Tik Tok lip-sync video.

Turn it on, it's fun.

The narrative arc of this gripping mystery is not simple and you do have to pay attention. But that's true to the source material of the novel. Moreover, the point of the story has more to do with complex issues of truth, social stratification, and the search for safety from trauma, than your garden-variety murder mystery usually serves up. Furthermore, the back-and-forth pattern of the storytelling emphasizes the reality of cataclysmic personal trauma: one can never really leave the terrible event in the past. To watch good people self-destruct under the weight of their own bad choices can be intensely moving, but that's why real tragedy has been a staple of great drama for thousands of years. Don't be afraid to give yourself the gift of seeing great actors in a terrible ordeal just because you might have to pay close attention to the time-shifting plot.