Critic Reviews
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“Sweetpea” feels fresh from beginning to end, offering us a gripping story right down to the final episode’s shocking cliffhanger.
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It’s a deft tonal balance between dark comedy and brutal violence. The show builds momentum by regularly throwing new obstacles at its protagonist to see how she’ll respond, and the excellent Purnell makes even its most chaotic moments believable.
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Purnell is the one, saucer-eyed and deadpan, who absolutely shines, managing simultaneously to be both fragile and savage with rage. Without her waif-like presence, it wouldn’t have half as much heft.
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While its setup has familiar elements, the show really comes into its own after a couple of episodes, as Purnell and Lecky get more screen time together and a character who shares Rhiannon’s outcast perspective (Leah Harvey’s Marina) starts investigating the murders.
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What makes the British series more unsettling and ultimately more compelling is its willingness to sit in the murky middle ground separating vengeance and cruelty, victim and perpetrator.
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While other shows in this vein have had difficulty sticking the landing, Sweetpea does more than enough to inspire confidence that, no matter what happens, it remains an addictive watch through to the very end.
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Billed as a "coming of rage" story, Sweetpea is one of those rare limited series that leave you desperate for more; a perfect autumn binge-watch, it's amplified by Isabel Waller-Bridge's killer soundtrack.
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It’s all a bit derivative (female Dexter meets a more housetrained Villanelle), and sometimes the YA origins make things feel underdeveloped, but it’s intriguing nonetheless, with an assured, mischievous performance from Purnell.
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I really wanted to enjoy Sweetpea, but the six episodes never manage to elevate beyond the simple “quiet girl is really a killer” plot.
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Sweetpea is slick and stylish and well worth a couple of hours of your time. .... The problem is that Sweetpea is never quite as twisted or devious as it thinks it is.
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“Sweetpea” quickly loses its own thread, making it impossible to see Rhiannon’s actions as anything but unhinged.
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The story is thin, the motivations thinner and the stakes low. You don’t need to have met Sweetpea in her original, glorious form to find drips dull. They take care of that by themselves.