The acting was great and personally I enjoyed the pace. I like drama so I wasn't disappointed that it focussed on the people involved, in a way for me that made it worthwhile converting it from a documentary. I got the impression the show intentionally obfuscated things to make the case seem more complex than it was. I probably would have rated it higher but it was frustrating to me that they introduced several things, the owl, the previous victim (Ratliff), the coroner being pressured into saying Kathleen died from bludgeoning, the implied specific but ultimately ambiguous issues of the younger son - but then never told us what happened with those things. Seemed to me the previous Ratliff death made the guy guilty for sure, did they think we'd forget about it if they downplayed it or did I miss something? Also, the timeline was confusing, and in the second half seemed to get even more confusing. I dunno. It started out strong and became increasingly flawed. It was still above average quality to me; engaging, suspenseful, the way the mood was manipulated between scenes allowed for impressive transitions between comedy and tragedy and made me empathize with the characters a lot, the irreversible life and time lost by the documentarians. But I came away from it feeling it was a bit messy.
Review of The Staircase
