I watched The Devil in Ohio on Netflix. Sadly, the experience was rather disappointing for me. I hoped it would go differently in its narrative. It has a lot going for it, the soundtrack is awesome, so are the visuals, but I found some of the choices they made poor.
I can't really confidently comment on the portrayal of the cult, but it felt half-assed and underwhelming to me. I've definitely seen better in films and series.
It actually reminded me of Ghost Wars in its flaws. The actions and reactions of the characters weren't always plausible or organic to me (like that dude from that center who pulls a weird face when Mae says her thanks? What was that about? Or Isaac for that matter, even before Mae and Jules were friends for a hot second. Like they just had an instant dislike for her when Mae hadn't to our knowledge behaved strangely to them).
I can definitely can get behind Suzanne's and Mae's characterization (Alex too, really, but he was in the end just a good cop without much else going for him), but not so much for the rest of the cast.
I can understand some of the concerns the characters have in regards to Mae, especially when we find out what the cult is capable of and that they approached Suzanne and her family for fostering Mae. It was not a good call of Suzanne to bring Mae into their home the way she did. Sure, Mae didn't let the hostility scare her, but she clearly is a very traumatized girl who probably needs a whole lot of therapy which I think Suzanne couldn't provide entirely.
It triggered her own trauma which she hadn't addressed apparently very well herself. Mae and her were imprinting on each other a lot. I also do see that Mae behaved sometimes manipulative or dangerously, I feel like the narrative wants to frame it like she is actually a bad guy, especially considering the end? But I feel like it's due to the way she grew up in that cult and her deep desire to stay with the family or at least Suzanne. And that's kind of fucked up and to be honest, while I think the way they portrayed it was poor, I understand the dad's decision that his children shouldn't be around their mom or Mae for now (he flips a little when it comes to pointing fingers, in the end saying it was his fault too because he didn't reign Suzanne in better or whatever and was definitely blaming a teenager at one point). Don't get me wrong, I hated how they handled that conflict within the family. But while the kids were douchebags (well, Jules and Helen were, Dani was initially friendly, but then grew cautious) to Mae, I can buy into teenagers having a hard time dealing with a very traumatized person and it's fine if the dad decides he would rather have his kids not around that. They surely told him off-screen what they had experienced. The fact that Mae's brother approached Jules was definitely a big fucking thing (who later on looked forward to killing Suzanne). I just think it sucks that in their eyes Mae was responsible for it all and I also don't think the kids were ever in serious danger in Mae's presence (though again, her life experience led her to do questionable things and I think it's fair to say that she did some of them selfishly, but the narrative should have discussed that better, especially considering the ending. Also did I miss the part where Suzanne made sure Mae was going to therapy??) But, it was dangerous for them in association. I hated how they framed the victim Mae here. Same in some ways with Suzanne. The fact that her family was commenting on the whole situation, along the lines of, 'hopefully mom gets her shit together.' Was Suzanne going overboard with a dangerous cult and acted recklessly at times? For sure. But it isn't like Mom just doing something silly and annoying. Like??? Should have phrased that way differently. Besides, the fucking cult is to blame here for being that way and not Mae and Suzanne (who initially didn't know the extent and just wanted to help a young person in a hard situation). I'm definitely torn on this.
I just think the execution was bad. Some of the conflicts felt far-fetched and half-cooked. I don't mind an open, bittersweet or unhappy ending at all, but this one felt weird.
And what is the final message of the series? Like many Netflix productions, funnily enough, I feel like this show didn't know exactly what it wanted to be?
I don't think I liked it.
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