Bloodline, Season 1- Review

Bloodline is not just one of the most suspenseful shows to come out in the past few months, but surely also one of the wettest. Not only does the show take place on the Florida keys, but there’s flash forwards that take place during rainstorms, there’s a shocking abundance of scenes where characters go rowing, and a surprising amount of dead bodies are found in swamps. I’m not going to use this fact as an excuse to make a lame joke about you needing to keep a towel with you while watching, but whereas most shows which take place in Florida stay on land most of the time. This show gets down and dirty when it needs to, which is what makes it so great- Bloodline is a taut, beautifully paced revenge thriller that pulls no punches when it comes to showing the consequences of the characters’ actions. Living in Edmonton, the same weekend this show debuted on Netflix, snowstorms were a regular occurrence. Now I’m not a superstitious man by any means, but if I were, I’d have interpreted the snowstorms as a message from the Heavens to not go anywhere but to the living room and binge all 13 episodes of Netflix’s latest yarn.

Bloodline comes from The Kessler brothers, the same creators as FX’s underrated thriller Damages. It’s not only the next step in the already skilled writers’ evolution, but also a huge step forward for Netflix in general. After the mediocre debut season of Marco Polo and disappointing third season of House of Cards, Netflix got back on its feet with Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, and now there’s Bloodline, the beautifully intense thriller about betrayal, murder and family issues. What makes Bloodline so engaging and aggressively bingeable is the style of storytelling- rather than throwing everything at us all at once with little left to the imagintion, the Kesslers choose to resort to the style they so expertly utilized in Damages– establishing the characters and who they are first, teasing you with some bits and pieces of the outcome of the season, and then getting to the meat of the story. Make no mistake, the story featured here is a rather typical black sheep story, but the execution is what truly makes it. Despite being rather slow-paced, this is also a story that greatly benefits from being watched back-to-back. The execution is what reminds us of just how important a slow-burn could really be to a story, especially one that experiences huge shift in pace as the story nears its end.

Bloodline is centered around the Rayburn family, a wealthy family who owns a popular hotel resort on the Florida keys. Sally and Robert Rayburn, the business founders and owners, hold a successful 45th anniversary event at the hotel, and among its many attendees is Danny Rayburn, the black sheep of the family. For much of the first half of the season, it’s made clear that he’s the member of the family that is most looked down upon, but you’re only given brief glimpses of why. His arrival seems to bring bad omens- after Robert Rayburn suffers a stroke, he offers the rest of his family to help with the business, to which they object. John Rayburn already has enough on his plate, dealing with a murder case of multiple women found with burn marks all over their bodies, but Danny’s arrival brings more stress. Soon, it becomes clear a horrible tragedy happened years ago they blamed him for- which wasn’t his fault, and Danny finally reaches his breaking point, threatening to reveal secrets that can tear the whole family apart.

Bloodline, as I mentioned earlier, isn’t the most lightning paced of shows, but strangely enough, that’s one of the best things about it. It uses its slow-burn to create a story that’s just as gripping as it is brooding- the show’s lush opening titles and beautiful, sun-drenched settings hide the show’s dark heart of it all. The show does eventually pick up in the second half, where we witness Danny’s transition from sympathetic human garbage to vengeance-sick monster, thanks to some fine acting from Mendelsohn, who gives one of the best performances of any show in years. The penultimate episode is where the show reaches its breaking point- the worst happens at this point, and the episode that follows after shows us the truly devastating consequences, something that George R.R. Martin would be proud of.

In short, Bloodline won’t be for everyone; its slow pace will definitely put some off, and people may find themselves overwhelmed by the amount of revelations that come from the second half. But don’t let that deter you from getting into Bloodline- its engaging performances and taut, tense pacing mixed with a particularly wild final 30 minutes will make for some of the best TV you’ll see all year, and will leave you awaiting season 2 with much anticipation.