okay. *deep breath*. THIS SHOW WAS NOT GOOD. i was actually excited for this. i like the books, the casting was good and the trailer looked pretty promising so i actually didn’t expect to dislike it as much as i did. let’s just get the obvious over with and say that there were about one billion unnecessary changes that pissed me off. it’s almost as if they only used the biggest plot points from the book and then made things up as they went. i’m all for making changes that make sense in the format it’s given and tv shows obviously differ from books. not everything can be perfectly adapted, but JESUS CHRIST i’ve never experienced this before. i can count the things i recognized on pretty much one hand. i was slightly disappointed with the vibe of the show if that makes sense? i wanted it to be darker and more intense. it just didn’t feel like a murder mystery to me. i would’ve liked to see more of a dark academia vibe, more grimy. this is just a preference though and doesn’t factor in to the quality of the show, but i still thought it was something worth mentioning since i kept thinking about it. something else i was thinking about: SHOW DON’T TELL. this show has an exposition problem that kept driving me crazy. it would’ve been so interesting to see more flashbacks. i would’ve loved to see the argument between elliot and andie or sal’s final moments. instead we were just told what happened and it left me feeling absolutely nothing. seeing elliot kill sal would’ve been CRAZY, but NOPE. we just got a scene of him telling that girl about it and that was it. we also didn’t really get a real explanation as to why he kidnapped that girl, but whatever. they left so many things out, like things that are pretty fucking important if they want to continue making the show. nat’s character was there for literally five seconds and then we never see her again. shouldn’t she have a bigger part in case they want to make a season two? instead she’s pretty much replaced by her brother which i didn’t understand at all. AND WHERE WAS STANLEY FORBES?! why wasn’t he there?!?! and why did pip have zero contact with the police aside from a few short conversations with dan? none of this made sense! the becca reveal wasn’t set up at all either. we got no mentions of her well being or her home situation until the end. there was no set up of the bell family conflict UNTIL THE END. they showed us ONE secret phone call jason made in the first episode and that was it. shouldn’t we have gotten more clues about jason’s treatment of his family? or the fact that becca was extremely unstable & had suffered from self harm and eating disorders? since we got none of that it didn’t really make sense as to why becca even did what she did! and let’s be honest, the only reason yall are giving this show five star reviews is mainly because of pipravi. and listen i get it. i really do. their scenes were cute (albeit a bit corny at times) & emma and zain did what they could with what they were given, but it still wasn’t enough to save this show. not even close. sorry, but not really. you know how certain shows or movies feel like a love letter to already existing fans? yeah… this was the opposite of that. this was not for people who read the books. but at the same time there were a lot of things that i know would be confusing if i HADN’T read the books so ???? everything about this show was disappointing. i feel bad for the cast since it seemed like they had a lot of fun creating this, but this just wasn’t good. i’ve tried to look at it from the perspective of someone who hasn’t read the books, but i honestly don’t think that would make it better. maybe just a little bit, but not by much. i haven’t been this let down by a show or movie in a long time. it’s such a shame too because the source material is actually good and they could’ve done something really cool. they just didn’t seem to care enough to do so.