DEFENDING JACOB: Successful Blend of a Thriller and Whodunit

Andy Barber (Chris Evans) and his wife Laurie (Michelle Dockery), a respectable young middle-class couple, living with their 14-year-old son Jacob (Jaeden Martell) in a two-story house in a typical American suburb, are faced with such a problem. The Barber family is almost too model – Andy and Laurie are deeply in love, he is a talented lawyer, an assistant district attorney, she starts every day with a jog and fulfills herself professionally at a foundation helping traumatized children. Defending Jacob

Even Jacob, being at the age when rebellion is the basis of existence, is an exceptionally well-behaved child who always does his homework and stops playing console games when his parents ask him to.

One day, their small town is shaken by a terrible crime. In the city park through which Jacob passes every day on his way to school, the body of his schoolmate, Ben Rifkin, is found.

The first suspicions fall on a local sex offender, but evidence found at the crime scene turns the investigators’ attention toward the teenage Jacob. The boy’s father, who initially takes part in the investigation, is immediately removed from it. Laurie, devoted to her work, receives a suggestive official instruction to avoid showing up for some time, while young Jake must face online hate and accusations from peers on social media.

The family is struck by social ostracism, and the idyll slowly turns into hell.

For Chris Evans, playing the role of the father – an ordinary mortal deprived of Captain America’s superpowers – the only option left is to launch his own investigation and stand firmly by his child, thrown to the mercy of a ruthless and cynical prosecutor. The Barbers must fight not only against the system and social exclusion but also with themselves, when doubts arise in their minds about their son’s innocence, along with questions about their own guilt and parental failures.

It is precisely in these critical moments, when parental love begins to crack and doubt takes over, that the screen is stolen by Michelle Dockery, known above all from Downton Abbey for her role as the cool, reserved English aristocrat Lady Mary Crawley, giving a display of her dramatic skills. With his acting, Jaeden Martell skillfully fuels the doubts arising in the minds of Jacob’s parents, as well as those of the viewers, balancing on the edge of two extremes – his withdrawal, emotional coldness, and strange behavior can be seen either as the rebellious attitude of a growing teenager or as signs of murderous psychopathy.

Defending Jacob is another excellent Apple TV+ series after The Morning Show and Servant. Based on the book by William Landay, this successful blend of psychological thriller and whodunit crime film with a touch of courtroom drama is the work of Norwegian director Morten Tyldum, who, before making The Imitation Game (2014) and Passengers (2016), directed the thriller Headhunters (2011) based on the novel by popular crime author Jo Nesbø. Looking at Tyldum’s overall work, it seems that this is the genre in which he feels most at home – Defending Jacob exudes a truly Scandinavian chill and detachment from the events shown on screen, keeping the viewer in suspense and uncertainty until the very end as to whether Jacob is responsible for the crime he is accused of.

The interestingly cast supporting roles are also pleasing, with well-known actors constantly appearing. The family’s lawyer is played by Cherry Jones – known from Sally Potter’s The Party, the district attorney – Sakina Jaffrey, known to fans from her role as Linda Vasquez in House of Cards, Andy’s father – J.K. Simmons, currently enjoying an acting renaissance, and the prosecution’s employee – Betty Gabriel, whose face kept nagging at me until I realized she played the distant, mechanical-moving housemaid in Jordan Peele’s Get Out.

All these praises do not mean that the production is without flaws. Defending Jacob at times turns too much into a drawn-out family melodrama and often loses its pace. Tyldum failed to hide the fact that the series is an adaptation of a book (incidentally, the director altered this and that in the ending to leave a door open for a second season) – one can feel that he had material for a satisfying feature film, which instead was turned into an eight-episode series.

This does not change the fact that Defending Jacob is one of the most interesting series of recent months and a very solid entry in its genre, which will certainly not disappoint fans of crime mysteries and psychological thrillers.