SHOW:
Shining Girls
WHERE TO WATCH:
OUR RATING:
4.5/5 Stars
WHAT IT'S ABOUT:
Newspaper archivist Kirby Mazrachi's dreams of becoming a journalist are put on hold after she survives a brutal attack that leaves her in a constantly shifting reality.
WHAT WE THOUGHT:
Trauma and grief are odd beasts - forces that can impede a person's inner growth or serve as a catalyst. It's almost always an external force, encroaching onto people's lives without their permission, and how one reacts to it varies from person to person. It has been the subject of many a story, but few have tackled it as imaginatively or horrifically as Apple TV+'s supernatural thriller Shining Girls.
The eight-episode limited (probably) series centres around Kirby, a newspaper archivist still struggling to recover from an assault that almost took her life and turned her reality into an ever-shifting nightmare. When the body of another woman killed in a similar fashion to Kirby's attack is found, she starts to hunt down the killer with the help of a journalist, Dan. But the closer they get to the truth of the serial killer's twisted mind, the more it seems impossible.
Despite being set in an American city, the series is based on a novel by South African writer Lauren Beukes - a prolific fantasy and horror writer that has had incredible success locally and internationally. If you've read the book, it's important to know that there are many changes, almost all necessary for the small screen and signed off by Beukes while serving as executive producer. Instead of being told from the perspective of every victim, it's all told from Kirby's perspective as she pieces the murders together. They left the romantic subplot out entirely with only hints of it, added some new elements and characters and fleshed out the killer's background a little more - without giving him too big a stage. While I haven't read this book in particular, I am familiar with Beukes' other work, and it's clear that this TV version is its own 'person', retaining the heart of the original but giving an audience a more well-rounded experience.
Played by the super talented Elizabeth Moss (Mad Men, The Handmaid's Tale), it's a tragically accurate portrait of a broken, traumatised woman that tries to take back her power from the one that took it. Every time her reality changes - a pet, her hair, her partner, her job - she has to relive the grief of what she's lost in her old reality. It encapsulates in stark contrast the waves of trauma that can hit a person, focusing entirely on the victim without glorifying the perpetrator. Moss uses her talent for subtle cues honed in The Handmaid's Tale here to great effect and has an iron grip on Kirby's story arc - evolving from a timid bomb struck survivor to harnessing a power that not only helps her accept and remould her trauma but also help others. She is such an engaging actor, carefully selecting her projects where she can truly shine, and this series is no exception.
This performance is perfectly balanced with Jamie Bell's (Rocketman, Billy Elliot) rendition of her misogynistic, prideful and greedy enemy. Creepy, meticulous and unsettling, Bell plays a perfect villain, despicable from beginning to end. Luckily, the TV writer veered far away from giving him any redeeming qualities or tragic past that would help you 'understand' his actions. From beginning to end, he's a loathsome creature, using his ill-gained supernatural means to target women he deems 'rising above their stations'. Bell is incredibly meticulous about his performance and has the ability to switch the charm on and off depending on his character's needs. Alongside Moss, they make a great ensemble despite only sharing the screen a few times throughout the series, but when they do, the show shines brilliantly.
As for journalist Dan, played by Wagner Moura (Narcos), he's almost a buffer between the two, balancing between his addiction demons and wanting to tell people's stories. He's quite a sad portrait of a journalist, struggling to cope with his obsession with following the story, but he has a tender-filled dynamic with Kirby/Moss and is the most human character in the story.
My only gripe with the series is the end - abrupt, almost anticlimactic and depressing, with Kirby never fully healing. We don't get many answers about how the supernatural elements work. While unravelled mystery sometimes works, in this case, it's more irksome than anything else, leaving the audience with a grating dissatisfaction. With its finality, it's unlikely that there would be a second season that would move beyond the book, but it still feels somewhat incomplete.
However, the lacklustre ending shouldn't put you off Shining Girls in the slightest. There's more than enough to chew on throughout the show, and between great writing and exceptional performances, it will keep you hooked until the end. More than anything, it will inspire you to go out and grab a few of Beukes' work and see what else her insanely imaginative brain has come up with.
WATCH THE TRAILER HERE: