Review: Dead to Me, Season 2 Goes Deep, More Trauma than Comedy

The first season of the Netflix traumedy Dead to Me felt like lightning in a bottle. There was no way to describe the plot without spoiling it, so most reviewers simply glowed about the casting and specifically the chemistry between Jen Harding (Christina Applegate) and Judy Hale (Linda Cardellini). Jen, the sarcastic, recently widowed mother of two, and Judy, sweet-natured, empathetic, but mired in guilt over a dark secret, are perfect foils when they meet at their grief support group. As the action unfolds, and we learn more about Jen’s relationship with her late husband and the nature of Judy’s with her boyfriend Steve (played by James Marsden), the twists of what becomes a murder mystery are high-key M. Night, but actually, you know, good. Now of course, as with many successful television series, the risk of a second season is that everything that made it successful in the first place will peter out, the magic of the original ruined. The writers will lean so far into the personality quirks that made characters compelling as to instead make them annoying. Elements like flashbacks and dream sequences will feel less like clever storytelling devices and more like cheap gimmicks. The writers will render a plot so convoluted as to write themselves into a corner. (See: Lost, Heroes, Game of Thrones, arguably West World.) At first, it’s not clear this fate isn’t befalling Dead to Me’s second season, but it quickly establishes that the writers know exactly what they’re doing. All …