Nowdays most of the USA TV production is quite shortlived - many shows don't make it to the end of season 1, so the viewers are reluctant to devote their attention not knowing how long the show will live. So, investing into a show that has only 1 season (and you get everything explained at the end) seems to be a pretty good deal.
Harper's Island won't sweep you off your feet in the first episode, but give it a few more and you'll soon find it entertaining. While the concept is nothing new and basically comes down to guessing who the killer is only to find that in each episode the prime suspect ends up being hacked, slashed, spiked, chopped or hanged, and thus eliminated from the offered suspect pool.
HP has some good creepy moments, but also tends to drift into being overly dramatic. The actors are mostly OK, they pull what they can from the paper characters they're assigned with, and somehow the show pulls through episode after episode.
Unfortunately, exactly at the beginning of episode 9 everything goes to hell. The characters start acting like their IQ has been reduced to zero, they make completely stupid and illogical decisions and you're left wondering what the heck happened with this show.
SPOILER ALERT!!! For example, in one scene the killer finally presents himself to the trapped survivors. He's armed with some sort of a harpoon and they're armed with 2 shotguns. He manages to butcher one girl that's holding the shotgun, while everyone else observes this without interfering. Then everyone escapes, leaving one guy armed with a pocket knife to fight off the killer. That includes the girl with the other shotgun. She locks herself in the bathroom with the gun, waits for the killer to kill the poor guy, and then at the first sound of him going for the door of the toilet, she blasts two holes in the door - and of course misses the killer.
At this point I just turned it off and have no intention to watch the remaining 4 episodes. It's really disappointing.
Harper's Island won't sweep you off your feet in the first episode, but give it a few more and you'll soon find it entertaining. While the concept is nothing new and basically comes down to guessing who the killer is only to find that in each episode the prime suspect ends up being hacked, slashed, spiked, chopped or hanged, and thus eliminated from the offered suspect pool.
HP has some good creepy moments, but also tends to drift into being overly dramatic. The actors are mostly OK, they pull what they can from the paper characters they're assigned with, and somehow the show pulls through episode after episode.
Unfortunately, exactly at the beginning of episode 9 everything goes to hell. The characters start acting like their IQ has been reduced to zero, they make completely stupid and illogical decisions and you're left wondering what the heck happened with this show.
SPOILER ALERT!!! For example, in one scene the killer finally presents himself to the trapped survivors. He's armed with some sort of a harpoon and they're armed with 2 shotguns. He manages to butcher one girl that's holding the shotgun, while everyone else observes this without interfering. Then everyone escapes, leaving one guy armed with a pocket knife to fight off the killer. That includes the girl with the other shotgun. She locks herself in the bathroom with the gun, waits for the killer to kill the poor guy, and then at the first sound of him going for the door of the toilet, she blasts two holes in the door - and of course misses the killer.
At this point I just turned it off and have no intention to watch the remaining 4 episodes. It's really disappointing.