The second season of Accused was quite the experience.
The anticipated series returned with a studded and shortened season. While it made do with its eight episodes and strong cast, the overall conclusion is that the sophomore season was underwhelming and inconsistent.
It didn’t meet the same standards as the first season. But let’s get into all of that with our Accused Season 2 Report Card.
Taylor Schilling was fantastic as an overwhelmed, working wife and mother to a child with behavioral issues on Accused Season 2 Episode 2.
The hour was one many could resonate with as it all boiled down to having an awful day. Everything that could go wrong went wrong for April as work, family, and life demands probed at her at once.
Road Rage takes center stage, but the hour does a fantastic job of touching on other issues in more nuanced ways to build up to the damning moment at hand.
It sheds light on the type of caretaker burnout that people like April, particularly mothers, often endure, as well as the lack of support that happens in an imbalanced marriage.
Apil’s journey to seek help for her special needs son is particularly compelling and illuminating regarding the plight of securing services and help for families in need.
Her hectic morning turned into something far scarier and more sinister as a bout of road rage escalated to something beyond comprehension that had her and another driver’s life at risk and eventually resulted in tragedy.
The entire hour unfolds like a suspense thriller as we watch April and a truly deplorable fellow driver, played by Justin Chambers, engage in a teeth-gnashing road rage incident that has you begging the screen for one of them to simply call it quits.
But no one does, as the stressors of her everyday life lead April to snap and fully commit to being as reckless and dangerous as the man harassing her.
“April’s Story” is thrilling and all too familiar, which makes it one of the most relatable hours of the season.
Even if you haven’t been in April’s shows or can relate to her on any level, you at least know people who have been and can.
The best episodes of Accused are the stories that simply nail the human experience and resonate with the audience.
“April’s Story” also has a satisfying conclusion that feels at least somewhat realistic, given the circumstances.
Everything about this hour should’ve been strong.
We had theater legends in an episode that centered on senior-aged friendship.
We’ve already discussed the importance of seeing senior-led stories on display and how long we long for simple tales like The Golden Girls, which remains a staple and beloved series to many three and four generations later.
But “Margot’s Story ” was nothing exciting. Its attempts to touch on things like grief or senior-aged loneliness fell short. And there was something offputting about how naive and gullible Margot was throughout the whole hour.
She didn’t have to be a likable character, but it would have at least been nice if she was interesting in any way, and she wasn’t. Nor was the case that involved a man scamming elders except for her because of some genuine connection they made that never popped.
Then Margot recklessly pursued her scamming dance instructor and, even more frustratingly, decided to help him escape. Overall, it was an underwhelming hour.
When we learned about the cast, Ken Jeong stepping into a more dramatic role was one of the biggest selling points for the second season.
I will not diminish Jeong’s performance as Eugene. He did a perfectly sound job, and I look forward to him pursuing other dramatic roles in the future.
But overall, Accused Season 2 Episode 7 was lackluster and dull. It was difficult to connect with or care about most characters, and very little of what transpired made sense.
Viewers pondered whether Eugene’s idolized version of his supremely flawed wife existed or was ever feasible. It was merely a passing question one had by the end of the hour that disappeared shortly after because it was hard to invest enough time to care about or even examine the questions and answers.
Accused typically raises interesting questions about humanity, our flaws, the complexities of the legal and criminal justice system, and more, but the hour mostly just left us feeling empty.
A sex robot scandal and murder would go down as Accused’s most bizarre episode to date.
Accused Season 2 Episode 8 took a big swing with this one, and it had mixed results. Some genuinely enjoyed the hour, while others lamented what this series used to be.
The episode’s cast was strong, and they all gave solid performances, but the plot felt like something from Black Mirror or Humans. What were we supposed to do with it?
And because “Megan’s Story” felt like something set in the near future, does that mean we have Accused expanding its timeline unexpectedly if the series returns for another season?
The salacious absurdity of the case overshadowed any conversations about AI, technology, ambitious women, and gender roles.
Taylor Schilling helmed “April’s Story,” and she performed like the rent was due by the end of the day and the clock was winding down.
Her performance was riveting. She kept viewers glued to the screens and sold every bit of April’s desperation, frustration, and frenzy. Schilling made April such a relatable character who jumped off the screen.
Schilling delivered a tour de force performance in a single installment, which is also why the episode was the best of the season and felt the most like Accused Season 1.
Chiklis can’t do much wrong, and he once again delivered another fantastic performance during Accused Season 2 Episode 4.
“Justin’s Story” covered so much ground regarding working-class people trying to make do with their lives and the crappy cards that life doles out to them with the desire to leave a dead-end town and aspire for better.
Via Justin, you could feel all the heartbreak, resentment, and love poured from him as the hometown hero whose great shot at making it big fell through.
He devoted so much time to ensuring that his athletes could get the chances that life took from him, and so much of that was clouded by the genuine love he still had for his ex.
The work-class heroes nature of this arc felt incredibly authentic and like a rare peak into the stories that most touch many Americans yet aren’t shown.
Of course, “Val’s Story” was all about the indelible Cobie Smulders, and it’s no surprise that she does a remarkable job carrying the role and sucking us into Val’s story and her experience as a domestic abuse survivor.
Val was compelling enough in her own right, but Shihabi, as Jordan, stole Accused Season 2 Episode 6. The episode easily could’ve focused exclusively on Jordan as it was every bit of her tale and experience, as Val’s.
Shihabi performed her role as such, a strong co-lead who could match Smulders bit by bit and fully capture the layers of exploring abuse and how it impacts those who are survivors of it.
It was a fascinating hour that did its diligence in adequately capturing trauma survivors. The stark contrast between Val and Jordan made for a well-rounded approach to addressing the subject matter.
Some of Shihabi’s standout scenes were her coming clean about everything while on the stand and her vulnerability when expressing the details of her relationship with Trey to Val, as the sisterhood between these two seemingly opposing figures was cemented.
The season was filled to the brim with some heavy hitters and familiar faces, and Accused typically does a decent job of utilizing each of them properly.
But William H. Macy was underused in Accused Season 2 Episode 1, Lorraine’s Story.
Considering that Felicity Huffman and William H. Macy starred in the sophomore season and actually alongside one another in an episode was a huge promotional point for the season, the result was shockingly underwhelming.
Macy’s character could’ve just as easily not been part of the episode for all of his importance, and his muted role and less than four minutes of screen time were extremely disappointing.
One of the season’s best and most unexpected plot twists was learning that victim TJ had a disabled twin brother in “Justin’s Story.”
We spent much of the hour trying to figure out the nature of the crime and why Justin was standing trial. For most of it, we could assume that he was on trial for disabling a rising athlete bound for greatness.
But then the hour pulls the rug from under our feet by revealing that it wasn’t TJ sitting in that courtroom alongside his mother, but his twin brother, Nico.
The twin reveal also added more layers and context to all the characters’ motivations and the situation at hand, which was now dire. TJ felt the pressure of making a name for himself, in large part so he could afford to take care of his twin.
Erica lied and covered for TJ and his steroid use because she needed him to make it big just as much as he did for the same reason of helping the family take care of Nico and his medical expenses.
Val and Jordan escaping any type of punishment for their actions veered deep into unrealistic territory, resulting in an ending that undermined an otherwise strong episode.
Val threatening the prosecutor with the possibility of lying on the stand and evoking double jeopardy shifted far into ridiculous storylines for the plot only and strayed from Accused’s usual approach when exploring the nuances of the justice system.
The blatant manipulation tactic was offputting and felt like a tacked-on ending for the sole purpose of providing Val and Jordan with the type of happy ending that often eludes women whose status as domestic abuse survivors frequently finds them victims of the justice system, too.
Accused Season 2 paled compared to its debut season, resulting in an incredibly underwhelming return.
The series’ formatting shifted a few times, making the approach to future seasons unclear, and it often felt as if the series lost sight of what made it so compelling in the first place.
Most of the cases were unmemorable, like Accused Season 2 Episode 3. They attempted to touch on too many themes and issues without properly delving into any of them meaningfully, or they didn’t address anything at all.
The second season had a strong cast of familiar faces we loved, but far too many were underutilized, or the material didn’t match their performances.
The whole season was inconsistent. In fact, we noticed a pattern of every mediocre or underwhelming installment being followed by a strong one that gave us glimpses of what the series used to be. As a result, the season never found its rhythm.
Unfortunately, for a highly anticipated series, Accused’s second season fell unfathomably short and resulted in an average and mediocre season, words one never envisioned uttering about this series.
Over to you, Accused Fanatics.
How did you feel about the second season?
What were your favorite parts? What do you think the series needs to work on?
Do you think it’ll get renewed? Sound off below!
The post Accused Season 2 Report Card: Flashes of Brilliance in a Sea of Mediocrity appeared first on TV Fanatic.
Source: TV Fanatic
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