Under the Bridge Review

It’s a universal truth that anyone who has been an adolescent girl (or has had an adolescent daughter) knows: Adolescent girls are absolutely ruthless. Think “Lord of the Flies” was a terrifying look at what adolescent boys can do? A version of that story with young girls would have been twice as cut-throat. Trust me. I lived through the hell that was the adolescent girl hierarchy and lived to tell the tale. And you couldn’t pay me enough money to go back to that stretch of time, and I doubt you could find a woman who would. All of this is to say that the horrific story told in Under the Bridge, an adaptation of Rebecca Godfrey’s book of the same name, will absolutely ring true to anyone who has run the gauntlet of adolescent girl behavior. It’s a complicated story – made all the more complicated by the insertion of Godfrey as a key character in the narrative being told – that doesn’t offer up any easy answers or easy characters to root for, which only serves to drive home the pain at the real-life story’s center.

Under the Bridge is, essentially, a true crime limited series. The story, like the book before it, follows the investigation into the 1997 death of Reena Virk (an excellent Vritika Gupta), a fourteen-year-old girl trying desperately to fit in with the “cool” group of girls. These girls, who are trying to be tough gangsters (as much as one can be a tough gangster living in the Vancouver suburbs on an island), smoke, drink, and run pretty wild (several of the girls are in a foster care group home that Reena frequents, attracted to their lack of parental oversight and their ability to live their lives however they want). Reena falls in with the crew, changing her behavior at home (Ezra Farouke Kahn and Archie Panjabi are her loving but overbearing parents, Manjit and Suman), and leading to clashes with her parents. And then the incident under the bridge occurs, leading to Reena’s disappearance and death, and leading to a host of questions as to just what happened to her and who might be responsible.

The series does two smart things in taking what could be a pretty rote whodunit and turning it into something with more heft. First, it doesn’t simply let Reena be a specter that lingers over the story but who we learn little about. Instead, we’re treated to a host of flashbacks of Reena’s life in the months leading up to her death throughout the series. And, even more intriguing, we are also allowed the chance to see her parents’ youth as well – how the story of an immigrant father and a first-generation Canadian mother impact who Reena grew to be. Reena is always present in the story of her murder investigation because the writing allows her to be. This is the rare true crime dramatization where I genuinely felt I understood just as much about the victim as I did about those convicted of her death, which was a lovely change of pace.

The second thing? Casting Lily Gladstone and Riley Keough as our central pair of investigators in the story. Keough plays the fictional version of Rebecca Godfrey, a woman who used to live in the town and returns home to work on a book about being an adolescent girl in the area (and just how hard it can be). She, naturally, stumbles upon a role writing about the murder investigation as soon as some of her sources for her original book make the suspect list. And then there’s Gladstone, fresh off her Oscar campaign for Killers of the Flower Moon, playing Cam Bentland, a local cop (and former friend – and maybe more – of Rebecca’s), who was adopted into a white family as a baby and still feels out of place in the community without any link to her Native past. Keough is great, but Gladstone, wow. She gives yet another performance that banks on her ability to bring stillness to drama, so that when she does speak, or move, or take action, it feels like a gun shot. Every moment Cam is on screen, it’s impossible not to watch Gladstone’s performance and take stock of just how layered it is all the time. If Keough’s Rebecca is a live wire trying to grasp for the truth, Gladstone’s Cam is a rock in stream, sitting silent but feeling everything rush over her and being changed because of it.

Another boon for the series is how exceptionally the casting team managed to select the young actors to take on the roles of the kids accused of the murder. Javon Walton, who plays Warren Glowatski, the only boy accused, will be familiar to audiences from his time on Euphoria, but his soulful performance will break your heart and also frustrate you to no end (a good thing, I promise). Alyana Goodfellow (Dusty), Chole Guidry (Jo), and Izzy G (Kelly) are each spectacular in their roles, creating complex characters from what could easily be one-note bullies. Goodfellow, especially, gets some lovely moments in latter episodes.

The series never tries to overly manipulate its audience with its storytelling. We get to see the warts each character possesses along with their good points (well, when they have good points – there’s at least one sociopath of a character). But if I had one major criticism of the series, it would be that there’s a bit too much time spent on telling Rebecca and Cam’s stories – which are interesting and compelling, hence attracting talent like Keough and Gladstone to the project – at the expense of spending a bit more time with some of the kids. Kelly and Jo, in particular, miss out on getting some additional characterization that is given to the other characters in the story. We’re told rather than shown how their lives took them to the place they go in the story, whereas we get to see some of the other characters on their journeys, providing additional depth to their characters that’s missing a bit with those two.

All in all, Under the Bridge is a mostly successful true crime drama that doesn’t forget to build its characters. There are a host of compelling, complex performances, and the writing never cheapens what happened to Reena – nor glamorizes those who killed her. The story tries to explore what could make adolescents kill one of their own (jealousy and racism are among the key markers for this story) and goes out of its way to show just who Reena was prior to her death. This isn’t a particularly easy watch, but it’s a story that will resonate with many – especially those who have dealt with their own adolescent horror stories.

Under the Bridge premieres on April 17 on Hulu. All eight episodes were provided for review.