Season one, despite the subpar acting and oftentimes horrendous writing, is worth a watch for the unique premise and interesting ideas presented. Just beware that you might find yourself shouting at your TV screen as you watch a character make a really dumb decision for the fifth time in one episode. 6/10 for uniqueness and being an entertaining watch despite its issues.
Season two is not worth watching at all. 3.5/10 - the keys become nothing more than a gimmick and never reach the same level of intrigue as the first season. It also feels like barely anything happens by the end of the season. The writing is even worse than the first season, and characters make even more dumb decisions.
I regret tuning in for season 3. Somehow it was even worse than season 2. Totally doubled down yet again on all the bad decisions made by the writers for the previous seasons. Add to that the addition of an awful new dull villain and you have the worst season of TV I've seen all year. 2.5/10.
Overall - 4/10. Season one is worth tuning in for, just to see some of the interesting ideas on display. But don't do yourself the disservice of continuing after that point - it really does go downhill big time.
Let me quote a Google audience review:
"I'm only about half way through the fifth episode but I'm so frustrated. I read through some of the other comments and I'm glad I'm not the only one pulling their hair out over the stupid decisions some of the characters make, especially Kinsey. Don't get me wrong it's an incredibly interesting concept and the some of the effects are super cool but certain aspects have me banging my head against the wall. There's a bunch of discoveries that are forgotten like the ghost key or characters that seem important but disappear for multiple episodes such as Ellie or the great great grandfather. Ellie made some kind of huge discovery where she yelled for Lucas into the well but then she's just gone. And the dad's just dead so they have a sad backstory and unanswered questions.
The mother is scarily detached from her kids' life and lets her youngest son who seems to be in grade school stay alone in a mansion by himself, even though he shows repeated concerning behavior talking about a lady in the well and whispering. I know her character is supposed to be a grieving mother who was never good at parenting but they just made her useless and pitiful. I'm seriously curious as to why we follow her story even though she seems kind of unimportant and neglectful.
And don't even get me started on Kinsey. She was already very rude from the beginning but she was traumatized and grieving so it wasn't that weird. But then she literally kills her ability to feel fear??? Like she's in high school she should know it's a vital feeling in order to survive!! After that her character just becomes painful to watch, she straight tells her mother that she's bad at parenting and she should just stick to painting and house renovations because "that's what you're good at" and she sees absolutely nothing wrong with that until she finds out her mom was in her life more that she thought she was. It's purely downhill from there, she then shows the guy she likes the keys which is a stupid thing to do you, don't just start showing people magic! He's freaked at first but then afterwards is totally chill about it?? She then abuses the music box key to absolutely humiliate this one girl, who, sure was mean, but she took it way to far! And then Gabe joined in on it and he was totally fine with the fact that she was using magic??? All the girl did was say that Scot was mediocre, and they made her humiliate herself in front of the school. Kinsey isn't cute or quirky and is far from the yeah new confidence you go girl! She became an awful character to watch and main characters with bad personalities makes it hard to cheer them on. I'm sure it was to show the addicting power to abuse the keys but still!
There are moments when the acting is a little lack luster, like most of it is totally fine but then it's just these odd few second scenes where the actors are just weird and 100% unnatural. Also the Well lady straight up killed two people for like literally no reason?? And we're just fine with that? If she's into killing why doesn't she use her power to threaten Bode into giving her the keys? And Kinsey and Tyler keep going back and forth from super close and buddy buddy to I hate you and at each others throats.
Hopefully the show gets better!"
- Marissa Hebert
Unfortunately, as Marissa likely discovers, it does not get better.
The first two seasons were absolutely great! The third season also started out strong but then from around the middle gradually declined to the terrible desaster of a "finale" which is the last episode of S3.
S1 & 2 were wonderfully paced, good character building, complex and believable solutions to complex and believable problems. S3 was rushed tf out the door. Good ideas with very much potential, but awfully paced and rushed. The story of S3 should've been at least 2 seasons on its own, rather 3 or more.
And that awful and boring happy-go-lucky ending with nonsensical "solutions" for all running plotlines did this series no favors whatsoever. It actually pushed my rating for this whole series from a 9/10 to a 7/10.
This is a shame since I'm usually not a fan of fantasy, but this series did so incredibly much right that I was drawn in from episode 1. And then they absolutely ruined it. I hate wasted potential and S3 is the definition of that.
I guess Netflix didn't want to pay the creators anymore and told them when they already had 3 to 5 episodes done, there's no other explanation for the third season. I'm incredibly disappointed.
Not with the creators of this show though, because as I said I think Netflix sent this series to crash and burn. And because of this I'm actually thinking about ending my Netflix subscription. Because this is unforgivable.
This has an interesting and unique premise. The location shots are magnificent and are of some of the most beautiful places on the planet (and within driving distance of my home). The acting of the principal performers is excellent. But, the writing and the auxiliary acting too often slip off their axels. At the end of season one, I was handing out 9s (superb) but the season premiere for season two fell to a 4 (bad) with bad acting, poor writing and sloppy logic. For the balance of season 2 there were great moments contradicted by glaring inconsistencies and no faithfulness to a canon. I would just get caught up in the mysteries, drama and storytelling and then it would all come crashing down with really poor characters, performances or flaws in the narrative. It was disappointing. Without spoiling anything, the finale of season 1 & 2 were divided into two parts. They begin with good news (something worthy of a series finale) and then take a sharp turn (as if they just found out they had been renewed and needed a new premise). Unfortunately, season 2 seemed to be founded on the weakest characters and storylines. If there has not been a final season 3, I would have had to average out the superb with the bad and give this series a 7 (worth a watch but beware the pitfalls) out of 10. Fortunately, Season 3 was a steady climb to excellence of pilot and performance of which we had had glimpses of previously. I give the series an 8 (great) out of 10 [Fantasy Mystery]
Review by daan banaanVIP 11BlockedParent2020-02-07T22:46:33Z
Three episodes in and I'm already seriously annoyed by the characters' irrational choices and unrealistic behavior. Keeping secrets or lying for no good reason, promising one thing and doing another, etc. And they keep doing it over and over. And I'm not even mentioning their almost casual reaction to discovering a magic mirror that serves as a gateway to another realm. After such an experience any real person would start to seriously question their f****ng sanity or at least have a panic fit and leave that house to never come back again. I know I would. But no, these kids are like: "Wow, magic door. I guess that's nothing to be seriously alarmed about." Even after losing their father in a horrific and traumatic event it doesn't seem to bother these kids at all that they just almost lost their mother too inside this magic mirror maze. And these are just a few examples on the top my head. There's much more where that came from.
It's like watching an '80 horror movie where someone in an already dire situation hears a scary noise and decides to go towards it instead of running to safety. And sure, that was okay then. Maybe fun even. But today, these 30-40 old "proven devices" have become just that: old. Really old, both literally and figuratively. But apparently 30-40 years was not enough time for these writers to come up with something different or original.
It's a shame really, because I think the story overall is quite interesting. But it is starting to become almost unbearable to watch when the only reason the characters behave the way they do is because it's the easiest way to move the plot into a certain direction. It's lazy writing like this that makes characters unbelievable and unrelateble.