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Not the overbearing score desperately trying to replicate the splendor of Bernard Herrmanns work with Alfred Hitchcock.
Not the consistent insistence on shoving various shades of green into every frame.
Not the acting, even when executed by performers who have been dynamic elsewhere.
Not the rudderless scripts.
Not the approach to postWorld War II American life.
Yet the most instructive scene in terms of the tangle of issues plaguing this misguided series comes later.
But this scenes problem is larger than mere repetition.
There is nothing redeemable to be found within the folds of these eight hours of television.
c’mon, do not let idle curiosity trick you into delving into this wretched enterprise.
Havent we learned over the last six months how precious life is?
Shes a cog that keeps the machine working, exacting and by the book.
Fletcher gives a tremendous performance thats placid, even icy, on the surface and barbed underneath.
Whom Ratched helps and whom she hurts dont always track.
Paulson is ultimately unable to create an emotional through line for the character.
Ratchedpresents 1947 America as a hardened vision of people powered only by their traumas.
Its a rich history worthy of study and empathy.
What should engender sympathy is stripped of meaning by the writing, which makes a joke out of melodrama.
Not one actor is doing memorable or engaging work.
Finn Wittrock as Edmund Tolleson aims for menacing and conflicted but comes off as an empty-headed brute.
The nature of origin stories is to argue that there is something meaningful about its central character.
That their life reveals something worthy of study.
That they are unique.
There are no moments of honesty inRatched.
There is no cunning or intelligent design.
There is no guiding theme rendering anything with import.
There is neither tension nor suspense.
