Spoilers below for Sharp Objects S1.01 — Vanish

Sharp Objects S1.01

Welcome to my weekly reviews for HBO’s Sharp Objects, based on the book of the same name by Gillian Flynn (author of Gone Girl). Each week, I will write about the episode with no speculation, since I’ve already read the book, and then I will include a Q&A with my boyfriend Dan’s theories, since he has not.

To start, I thought they did a great job with the reveal of Camille’s cutting in the last scene. My only problem with it was that throughout the whole episode, every character is drenched in sweat, and Camille, though in long sleeves & pants to cover her body, looks beautiful as always. She doesn’t even put her hair up! Come on, I know Amy Adams is gorgeous, but let’s make this realistic.

Establishing Camille’s backstory is difficult, but they did a good job of compressing the flashbacks in this episode to help the viewer understand. Shoutout to Sophia Lillis from It who plays young Camille — as the story goes on, I assume we’ll see more of her, which should be good.

Patricia Clarkson plays Adora, Camille’s mom, exactly as I imagined her. She is repressive, cold, anxious, pretentious. She has an edge, too, specifically when it comes to Camille. Marian, Camille’s younger sister, died as a child but was “perfect” as Amma, Camille’s much younger half-sister, lamented. While Camille never took the bait to be perfect, Amma tries to live up to Marian’s clout, at least while her mom is watching.

Outside of the house, Amma is the ringleader of the popular girls. They smoke weed, roller skate around in cute outfits, and deface memorials - you know, the usual. But, around Adora she’s all smiles and cardigans. Her main joy comes from her dollhouse replica of the beautiful home that they live in. Beyond that, who knows what Adora thinks she does for fun.

To start her story, Camille visits the family of Ann Nash, the first girl to be found dead a year ago. Ann was a rule breaker, “plain but smart.” Somewhere along the 10 block bike ride from her house to her friend’s, Ann was taken. She was found strangled, with all of her teeth missing. Grim. At least she wasn’t raped, her father notes.

The first episode does not give us much in the way of whodunnit. Let’s see what Dan thinks is going on:

“I have no fucking idea.”

Who is a suspect?

“Definitely her half sister did it, because she was jealous. But also, the sexy doctor from The Mindy Project [the detective] is for sure in on it. There’s not really too much to go on, but if I were to guess, I would say that the suspicious silhouette staring at her [Camille] from across the bar had something to do with it, too.”

What should we remember from this episode?

“All of the words on Camille’s body. The mom’s a real weirdo, she probably also killed those girls. And I imagine if she did it, then the stepdad is in on it too. But then also Ann’s dad. But, independently, I don’t think they were working together.”

There we have it — one episode in and we don’t know anything. Maybe next week we’ll get some more solid information to go on.