Critic Reviews
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On top of the excellent writing and performances, A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder is given a backdrop with a well-rounded, potentially timeless aesthetic that relies on being soft instead of flashy.
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The series is equal parts clever mystery and classic teen tropes—from a budding romance between unlikely partners to navigating a newfound sense of adolescent rebellion—with a delightful dash of quizzicality thrown in.
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An involving ride — not so much for the plot as for the characters (which is how all detective stories live or die) and a great performance by Emma Myers (“Wednesday”) as its central sleuth, Pippa Fitz-Amobi.
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Her quest to solve the case puts her in a lot of dicey scenarios — seedy, yeah, but also just too grown-up, and Myers’s luminous performance beautifully and poignantly synthesizes this blend of panic, regret, embarrassment, determination, courage, fear and stubbornness.
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A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder rides on the charm of Emma Myers, but there’s also a solid mystery to get to the bottom of, which isn’t always the case in shows like this.
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Whether you're a fan of the book or venturing into the world of AGGGTM for the very first time, this is a killer series that will almost certainly return for future seasons.
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With Emma Myers creating a performance that has us rooting for and caring about Pip from the moment she endeavors to crack the case, “A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder” makes for a satisfying viewing experience that won’t tax your soul or haunt your dreams.
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Myers makes for an appealing heroine, particularly when Pip and Ravi begin working together and arguing about which of them is Holmes and which has the “Martin Freeman energy” to be better suited as Watson. It’s not reinventing the wheel, nor is it the best possible version of the genre. (If you’re curious, Veronica Mars Season One is over on Hulu.) But as Pip keeps getting in way over her head, it’s not hard to understand why books, TV, and film keep returning to the archetype.
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For the first five episodes, particularly the penultimate one, which reveals a stunning twist, “A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder” engagingly unpacks the anguish of being a teenage girl, the complexities of friendship and the deceptiveness of appearances. But as Pip ties up loose ends in the finale, plotlines become jumbled and farfetched, as if the writers were racing to put a neat bow around the story.
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A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder didn’t exactly keep me guessing, but it kept me generally entertained across the six episodes, all under 48 minutes.
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Overall, A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder is solid viewing. It’s speedy enough—six 40-minute episodes—that no installment is devoid of action. Despite some slight British accent problems, Myers is mostly great as Pip, and compelling to watch, and the legendary Maxwell-Martin is fantastic as her mum.