ALL HER FAULT

I finally watched all of the Peacock limited series, All Her Fault, which seems to be popular, and decided to weigh in on it for several reasons.

One is to laud the entire cast. They’re all perfect, and give excellent performances, even the adorable little boy! I would not be at all surprised to see every one of them nominated for various awards this coming season, especially the star, Sarah Snook. (I hope I got that “SS” name right—it’s hard to keep the names of all these new actresses with those initials straight!) Boy, can that woman tear-up at a moment’s notice! It was weird to see Dakota Fanning as an almost middle-aged woman, though. And Mr. X and I were fans of Jake Lacy back when he played the cute, dumb boyfriend on a one-season sitcom, Better With You, so to see him like this was a tad difficult for me. (I know he played a much worse guy on a different recent mini-series, A Friend of the Family, but I purposely didn’t watch that disturbing one.) But, somehow, I was most impressed with Michael Pena’s detective, in portraying both his professional and personal lives. I believed it all.

Another reason for this article is to say that the entire eight episodes are riveting. I love that so many of the characters’ backstories, especially that of the main detective, are included.

But mainly, I really want to discuss the several holes in the script! They’re driving me crazy! I don’t know anyone else personally who watched All Her Fault, (a weak and misleading title if ever there was one,) including Mr. X, who was out of there the second he saw the sadness of an abducted child, so I have to get these peccadillos off my chest here.

Hole #1: This is the biggest one of all: The two main families are very rich, especially the one whose son goes missing. Have any of you noticed what else is missing??? A housekeeper!!! There is absolutely zero way that a couple who both work, in finance, no less, and have a nanny for the kid, and have at least one extra home on their property, (in which the husband’s disabled brother lives,) clean that humongous house themselves!!! In real life, they’d actually have a team! That hole in the script is just insane. I don’t know if it was written that way in the novel, but it would be nuts in there, as well.

And no—the nanny would not be the one to clean that entire domicile. I’m sure the lack of a cleaning character, (and none in the mom’s new bestie’s house, as well,) is to not overcomplicate the tale. That presence would require extra people to explain away, and there are already more than enough suspects.

Hole #2: SPOILER ALERT! (If you haven’t seen the show yet, and plan to, don’t read again until after “Hole #4,” the paragraph that begins with the word “Now.”): When there was that original horrific car accident between the couple and the eventual kidnapper six years ago, wouldn’t the cops and/or insurance companies have been involved? So the parties would have known each other pretty well and for a long time. And you just know that the young girl’s rotten father would have made sure that she sued the pants off the rich family, especially for the wrongful death of her child!

So the wife’s line to the girl in the final episode, “I thought you were dead,” doesn’t really fly. The backstory of the girl is really clever, but it could not happen in real life.

Hole #3: Speaking of the car accident, the powers-that-be at the head of the show made sure that we could not see whose fault it was. I hate that. At first, it looked like Carrie/Josie’s car got hit, but later the director made it look like it was the couple’s car that did. It can’t be both ways. There would have had to be a major investigation. A control freak like the new dad would have not let it go.

Hole #4: There is absolutely no way that Peter, the father of Milo, the kidnapped boy, could have taken him out of the motel room without the kid recognizing either his father’s voice or hands or feel or smell! He later told his wife that he put something over Milo’s face so the kid wouldn’t see him, but Milo was awake in the bathroom, so, at the very least, the dad would have had to tell him to cover his eyes, in which case the kid would have heard his voice! Then he put him in the trunk of a strange car, and we’re supposed to believe that the kid managed to find his way out of the trunk into the car’s interior??? How many of us could even do that??? I cry foul. And how did he get him in there? Did he look around the motel parking lot for a car whose trunk he could access all while holding an awake five-year-old child??? And then how did someone discover Milo in a strange car in the dark? And lastly, didn’t Peter realize that he was putting his son in danger? Milo could have gotten out of the car, into the parking lot, and been killed or abducted again!

Now, as to the story overall, it’s not actually “all her fault,” but these errors are the fault of someone involved! And that title is so misleading! The only things that are “her fault” are the changes made by screenwriter and producer Megan Gallagher from the novel by Andrea Mara!!!

My last thought on this tale is a very personal one, that some of you Los Angeles readers may remember, (because it was all over the local news at the time.) Even though he wasn’t a human child, when our precious toy poodle, Clarence, The Singing Dog, (who was my co-star on my TV show,) got dognapped at nine-years-old, I really did experience a lot of what this mother goes through in All Her Fault. I can attest to just how excruciating the pain is. Fortunately, we got him back within a couple of days because the kidnapper’s son ratted her out, and to him we’ve always been eternally grateful. But the horror and panic is totally real. And I’m sure that to live it with a child is a zillion times worse.

So All Her Fault is far from an upbeat saga. If you haven’t seen it, maybe it’s best to leave it until after the holidays.