An Ode About Eve

(Image courtesy: IMDb)

Earlier this year, I binged watched the hilarious Fleabag and became an ardent devotee of Phoebe Waller-Bridge. In an attempt to further enlighten myself with Ms Waller-Bridge’s work, I began to search for Killing Eve (KE) on all streaming platforms, but for some inexplicable reason, I couldn’t find it anywhere. Disappointed, I continued with daily life.

The gods of streaming smiled upon me this past Friday and blessed me by flashing the Killing Eve poster on the homepage of Hotstar. Grabbing the opportunity, I utilized the weekend to watch the first two seasons (the third is still filming). It’s too late for me to give a review, because, well, the show has been up since 2017, so here is a list of what I liked about Killing Eve and what I did not like

What I liked:

1.The female perspective

(Image courtesy: IMDb)

Stop reading this post here for a bit and look up the cast and crew of Killing Eve on IMDb. More than half of the crew are women, including the showrunner, the writer, the producer, the protagonist, the antagonist - you name it. There is a reason women should be part of storytelling because no man can ever get a woman’s perspective on a story right, especially if it’s a psychological thriller like KE is. Well done, girls!

2. The characters

(Image courtesy: IMDb)

A bit of spoiler-free context here - Eve (Sandra Oh) is with the MI5/6 and Villanelle (Jodie Comer) is a paid psychopathic assassin. Although the series begins with Eve and Villanelle sharing a typical cat & mouse relationship, it quickly shifts gears and takes a most unusual turn. In fact no relationship between any two characters in the series is ambiguous, and maybe that brings in a substantial part of the intrigue.Also, every character is driven by one force - boredom - and they work tirelessly against it. There is only one conventional character in the series, and that is Eve’s husband, Nico. Pretty sure this characteristic of his will change in season three!

3. The performances

(Image courtesy: IMDb)

A disclaimer here: Despite initially rooting for Eve, you will fall in love with Villanelle. I, for one, found myself conflicted at the end of every episode. The performances meted out by the two heroines are as nuanced as their respective characters are complex. Bonus points to Ms Comer for a bloody fantastic job with the accents! And Aunt Petunia (Fiona Shaw), how lovely to see you here! It’s a pity you didn’t have a longer role in the HP movies!


4. The wit

(Image courtesy: IMDb)

Wit beyond measure is man’s greatest treasure, goes the Hufflepuff motto. Pretty sure Lady PWB is a fellow Hufflepuff because her ability to insert dark wit into a gory assassin story/thriller is just mindboggling. Quite like Fleabag, the jokes lie in the situational dialogues and are delivered without affectation. There are moments of unexpected humor, which are pure black...erm..gold. Watch out for them!

There’s not much I didn’t like about Killing Eve, but some points did stand out like a sour thumb, so here they are:

1. Parts of the story

(Image courtesy: IMDb)

If you ask me whether Killing Eve has the best story for a thriller, I’d probably say no, especially not in the second season. This is me nitpicking, but it is quite possible to predict the story a couple of minutes before it actually happens. There are no GoT-style moments of shock or horror, which is mildly disheartening. The good news is that although season two was predictable in places, it ends in a very picturesque and poetic cliffhanger.


2. At times, Eve’s obsession is overdone

(Image courtesy: IMDb)

When the series began, Eve was an MI5 officer, doing boring clerical work. Her acumen and interest in female assassins leads to her obsession with Villanelle. In season 2, somehow Eve’s fixation with Villanelle seems to make her an incompetent intelligence officer, and all the qualities which initially made us feel for Evev begin to disappear. Not sure whether this is intentional by the makers - after all Sandra Oh is competent enough to portray all the complexities in a character like Eve and there is a high chance that in season three she will do just that - but it was a tad bit disappointing.


As you can see, I've listed about four positive points and two negative points (which were gathered after much deliberation!). The verdict is statistically clear - Killing Eve is a fab show. Go watch it on Hotstar. May the gods of streaming be kind to you!