His & Hers, a recent murder mystery on Netflix from showrunner Dee Johnson, adapted from Alice Feeney’s novel of the same name, weaves a narrative preoccupied with unresolved wounds and inherited trauma, particularly among those orbiting the crime. The series arrives equipped with many of the familiar elements that have come to define the platform’s prestige thrillers of late. Yet for all its narrative machinery and thematic ambition, it ultimately struggles to transform these components into a series that feels either emotionally penetrating or formally assured.
Anna (Tessa Thompson), an ambitious Atlanta-based television reporter, has been away from her profession following the death of her infant. When she returns, she discovers that her position has been filled by Lexy Jones (Rebecca Rittenhouse), a younger and rising anchor. Determined to retain a foothold in the newsroom, Anna proposes covering the brutal murder of a married woman, Rachel (Jamie Tisdale), in her hometown of Dahlonega, a small town in north Georgia, as a field reporter. Though initially reluctant, her editor agrees, assigning her Lexy’s husband, Richard (Pablo Schreiber), as her producer. The investigation is led by Detective Jack Harper (Jon Bernthal), who turns out to be Anna’s estranged husband. As the inquiry progresses, suspicion shifts uneasily between professional duty and personal history. Both Anna and Jack had intimate ties to the victim, and both appear to know more about the crime than they are willing to reveal.
A murder-mystery series can either embrace slowness, allowing atmosphere and doubt to accumulate or move at a brisker pace, drawing the viewer into the investigation through gradual disclosure. His & Hers attempts to occupy a middle ground, but its narrative progress proves so inert that even watching at double speed scarcely feels like a loss. Each episode opens with a cold prologue and closes on a cliffhanger, yet neither device generates the urgency or unease the material demands. The gestures of edginess feel dutiful rather than gripping. Murder, traumatic pasts, sinister glances, and blood on screen have long ceased to carry intrinsic charge. Without a sense of formal or cerebral novelty, such elements fail to command sustained attention. Although the series is neatly packaged into six episodes, it never achieves the gravitas or momentum associated with genuinely binge-worthy storytelling. The cardinal sin here is an unengaging screenplay. A protagonist burdened by a fractured marriage and the loss of a child, paired with an investigating officer entangled in an illicit relationship with the victim, is a configuration now overly familiar. If such well-worn premises are to justify renewed investment, they require freshness of perspective or execution. Unfortunately, the series offers neither, and its hesitations only invite scrutiny, exposing the thinness of its construction rather than carrying the viewer past it.
What might have offered some consolation—narrative misdirection in the form of twists and red herrings—also proves underdeveloped. As the investigation unfolds, suspicion predictably settles on the husband, Clyde Duffie (??Chris Bauer). It is revealed that he and his wife had an arrangement permitting her to pursue physical relationships outside the marriage, a concession he makes due to his diabetes and congestive heart failure, which have left him unable to meet her sexual needs. While this detail gestures toward moral complexity, it remains largely cosmetic, introduced and then abandoned without meaningful narrative exploration. The murdered woman, it later emerges, was a high-school friend of Anna’s. Their past includes a cheerleader figure who functioned as a classic mean girl capable of humiliating and bullying anyone she deemed expendable, even her own sister. Yet these characters exist less as people than as narrative utilities. They are present to be suspected, disposed of, or killed so the episodes can move forward, never acquiring the psychological depth that might have sustained intrigue or emotional investment.
Ultimately, what makes or breaks a series of this kind is the revelation of the killer and the circumstances that lead to it. In the final episode, the identity of the murderer is indeed disclosed, and the series attempts to engineer a last-minute shock. Yet the twist arrives as an aberration rather than a culmination. A late flourish cannot redeem a poorly prepared narrative any more than a garnish can rescue a ruined dish. The revelation might have carried genuine force had the preceding episodes sustained our investment in the investigative process. Clues never accrue with sufficient weight, and information is released through convenience rather than a sense of narrative inevitability. Instead, the mechanics of discovery lack gravitas, reducing the finale to a contrivance rather than a payoff. The series ultimately feels reverse-engineered, as though the final episode was conceived first and the preceding five hurriedly assembled to justify it.
Performatively, the series is carried some distance by Tessa Thompson and Jon Bernthal, whose committed work lends the material a degree of emotional credibility. There are moments of genuine feeling between them, particularly in scenes shaped by shared grief and unresolved resentment, but these flashes are repeatedly undercut by shoddy writing that fails to sustain emotional continuity. Sunita Mani, as Priya, Detective Jack’s partner, registers strongly in her scenes, while Crystal Fox brings quiet dignity to Alice, an elderly woman living with dementia. Ante Cheng and Doug Emmett’s cinematography captures Dahlonega in warm daylight and ominous nocturnal hues, often framing characters in states of emotional exposure. The rhythm established by editors Adam Epstein, William Henry, and Daniel Valverde occasionally imposes momentum where the script lacks it, while Mac Quayle’s score does much of the heavy lifting in generating tension and emotional emphasis.
His & Hers arrives with the familiar trappings of contemporary prestige crime television, but familiarity alone is no longer enough. Without narrative urgency or imaginative distinction, the series serves as a reminder that a murder mystery—especially one positioned as an early-year offering—demands more than atmosphere and competent performances.
