When it comes to twists and turns, some feel predictable although some are genuinely surprising. Meanwhile, some narrative developments and information pieces are quite unclear. Frequent contrivances do little to help. Narrative developments rarely feel natural or unforced, with information appearing exactly as and when it is needed. For the most part, the story unfolds from one place to the next. Consequently, character and narrative struggles never come across like realistic struggles, since they never last for long and we are never given a sense that the uncovering of vital information is difficult. And yet, the rallying cry that “we are close” towards the finale seems almost laughable when Amy proceeds to suggest an almost random person from the town. Verdict Flanagan and production partner Trevor Macy have the ‘Midas touch’ when it comes to creating films and TV series, he says, ‘and as an actor you dream about a scenario where you can be in a creative circle like that’. Charlie ( Robyn Lively, Twin Peaks) is convinced that there is a connection between her own missing daughter and another girl’s disappearance. Something is happening to the girls in Elrod, Georgia and Charlie won’t stop searching for the truth. Damn the consequences.

It’s happening again for this grieving mother and she steps completely out of her comfort zone to make sure that what started with her own daughter, ends with the latest abduction. The town might think she’s crazy and a pain in the police department’s ass, but she’s not wrong. Just look at the evidence and she is taking her message to the masses. I read that book, cover to cover. I just absorbed it. And I went a deep dive into YouTube videos and interviews with people from that island. So I can understand the mentality, because this character and these people are very specific. The way Mike and his writing team wrote them is very specific. Though there’s perhaps a few too many “missing kid mystery” tropes adhered to in Disappearance at Lake Elrod– the grieving mother, the potentially corrupt police, the buried secrets coming to life – writer/director Lauren Fash injects enough character development and psychological complexity for it to get away with it. Unfortunately, despite its best attempts to shake up the formula and offer something new in the mystery thriller genre, it feels quite generic and its best aspects are underutilised. Ultimately, it is all too easy to be left with a deep feeling of disappointment and thinking about what could have been.Not to sound too utopian, but: each other. I just wish people would give a damn a little bit more about each other, and about communication. Because I think there’s a huge breakdown in communication. We’ve lost the human touch. It’s easy to hide behind the keyboard of this device that I’m speaking to you with, and say, and write and do whatever I want. The kind of vitriol that I see that comes across this medium – nobody would ever say that face to face to one another. The whole point of having a “big reveal” in a mystery movie is to draw you deeper into the story, not have you wondering whether the cameras rolled too soon on a screenplay that needed a few more drafts. Call me simple, but a jumpscare. I love a great sting: loud music, loud noise and in the moment you don’t expect it. That’s the dopamine that I seek out when I’m seeing a horror show.

But that has happened to other limited series that have had some degree of success: it was meant to be a one-off but there was so much demand for it.’ There is, however, only so much forgiveness you can extend to a genre film that is striving to deliver a decent little thriller.Michael Trucco: This did not feel like her freshman effort at all. She’s extremely comfortable behind the camera. She’s really comfortable with her with her cast and crew. And that’s the sign of a good leader. I can’t wait to see what she’s going to do next. Because if this is her directorial debut, we’re in for some good things from Lauren. And that’s not the only spot of bother in Disappearance at Lake Elrod (also known as Through the Glass Darkly), a strained, cliché-ridden by-the-numbers missing person mystery that can’t make all the pieces of the puzzle snap together the way a good mystery should. As Charlie works to solve the case, she begins to experience strange occurrences. There is a frequent blurring of the past and the present, and of fantasy and reality. She struggles with visions of her daughter and memories from her life. However, whilst these make for some of the most hauntingly compelling and narratively interesting developments in terms of plot and character, Fash should probably have leaned into these horror elements even moreso, as these truly help the viewer to understand Charlie’s mindset and elicit genuine sympathy and mystery. Trucco, who previously appeared in Flanagan’s 2016 film Hush, added he would do Midnight Mass season 2 ‘in a heartbeat’. The film was shot entirely in the state of Georgia in a charming little town called Ellijay in the northern part of the state. And you’re right, the location is part and parcel to the story. It becomes almost a character in the film. It’s so important to storytelling that the location be authentic and reflect the mood and tone of the script. It’s really quite a beautiful part of the country, and being somewhat isolated in a small town helped inform the ‘southern’ setting of the characters. I did stay in a small hotel just outside of Ellijay for the duration of the shoot. It was only a couple of weeks, so it wasn’t a conventional “relocation” for me.

That community was super important for me to represent and to get right. That was the scaffolding of the character. It’s based on a real island that’s off the coast of Virginia called Tangier. There is a fishing community there. There’s book called Chesapeake Requiem: A Year with the Watermen of Vanishing Tangier Island. When a teenage girl goes missing Charlie is convinced the two incidents are somehow linked and embarks on her own investigation, with help from with story-hungry journalist Amy (Shanola Hampton). Right at the start of the series, you’re introduced to this unique, isolated, island community. How did you get yourself into that mindset? It’s a million miles away from you in LA…Like director Mike Flanagan, you went to Catholic school. Did that help you understand Midnight Mass? Centred around the disappearance of an 8-year-old girl – a mystery that has haunted her mother, Charlie ( Robyn Lively, half-sister to Blake Lively, for those playing at home), leading to bouts of emotional breakdowns and psychological hallucinations – the 90’s set thriller sets itself a year after Charlie’s daughter’s disappearance and the ramifications it has had. Lively portrays Charlie with a tragic stillness, the actress wisely adopting the less-is-more approach as she continues to seek answers from a small town that has essentially vilified her. Yeah, Midnight Squid Games Mass. That’s the one thing… Our producers were half joking… like, ‘Damn it, Netflix! Really? Did have to put Squid Game and us on the exact same day?’ It’s okay to have differences of opinion. But we are getting pushed to a breaking point. And particularly my country: we’re in this sort of cold civil war, for ideological reasons. This tribalism is terrifying to me. But I choose to see the glass half full, and I choose to be an optimist, and I choose to believe that we can care. We can give a damn about each other. How do you feel about the reported reboot of Battlestar Galactica? [Trucco played Samuel T. Anders in the acclaimed 2000s sci-fi series.]