A woman’s affair with her new boss conflicts with her new friendship with his wife.
SUMMARY
Louise Barnsley (Simona Brown) is a single mom who works as a secretary for a psychiatric clinic. On a rare night out, she meets David (Tom Bateman), a sexy Scottish doctor whom she kisses for a moment before he runs off. The next day, Louise is shocked to find out that David is her new boss. Louise soon bumps into Adele (Eve Hewson), an aristocratic woman who is new in town. Louise and Adele quickly become friends, only for it to be revealed that Adele is David’s wife. Louise soon begins two affairs, being Adele’s friend without telling David, and being David’s lover without telling Adele. However, it seems like there’s something more to Adele and David’s relationship, since Adele seems borderline afraid of her husband, and always on edge. There may be something more sinister afoot.
END SUMMARY
This show is bound to cause some controversy, because the show takes a hard left turn about two episodes from the ending. Since it’s only six episodes in total and thus I didn’t have a huge investment before this started, this didn’t bother me much, but I know that it will probably upset some people a lot. *I just checked Twitter and apparently this drove some people batsh*t.* I feel bad about this spoiler-ish reveal, but I honestly think that people might handle it better if they’re aware that something is coming.
As far as the show goes, Simona Brown gives one hell of a performance. She starts off with the very relatable desire to just have a night out, but clearly also loves her son dearly. When she meets David, we immediately see the spark between them and she sells that attraction perfectly. When she meets Adele, she sees a fellow damaged soul that she can bond with. In every interaction, Brown gives us much more than the script alone, and that’s pretty much the best you can ask for. Bateman and Hewson, however, are more than capable of keeping up. Hewson has to play a character who is clearly keeping much of herself in the shadows, while David plays a character whose morals are not obvious at any point. The three of them are the focus of the show, so if there had been a weak point, it would have likely stood out like a sore thumb, but instead, they build upon each other.
The story is revealed at just the right pace for the first few episodes. We get enough time to really get a feel for the lead characters and how they interact before we start to get deeper into the love triangle formed by them. There’s humor and a decent amount of sexual tension to keep you enticed, but there are also some sweet moments that make you want to care about these people. Under all of it, there’s clearly some amount of mystery building as well as the risk of everything being revealed and collapsing. It’s well-done, to be sure.
Overall, as long as you are willing to deal with a bit of a weird ending, I recommend this show.
***ENDING EXPLAINED***
So, as the show goes on, we find out that Adele was previously in a psychiatric facility (hinted by her medication) with a gay man named Rob (Robert Aramayo). She and Rob get into lucid dreaming, but then move on to astral projection. They learn to project themselves into people’s waking bodies, then Rob suggests that the two swap bodies. He then murders Adele (who is in his body), because he’s in love with David. Naturally, because Rob is not Adele, their relationship is never really successful. After David starts sleeping with Louise, Rob (as Adele) switches bodies with HER then murders Louise before starting a new life with David. So throughout most of the series, we’ve never actually known Adele, only Rob posing as her. Naturally, this means that the new relationship is probably doomed, because regardless of the body, Rob is a monster and will never give David what he needs.
This is truly a mind-screw, because the show doesn’t hint at anything supernatural until episode 5. Lucid dreaming is, to my knowledge, a real thing that people can train themselves to do. Astral projection is not. Suddenly dropping magic into a show that’s been otherwise really grounded does feel like a bit of a cop-out, but the show is literally called “Behind Her Eyes” and the secret is that behind Adele’s eyes is a completely different person. Oh, and the poster shows Rob in the woods sending his soul into Louise’s eye. It’s still not a super satisfying ending, but at least it made all of the tension feel merited.
If you want to check out some more by the Joker on the Sofa, check out the 100 Greatest TV Episodes of All Time, Collection of TV Episodes, Collection of Movie Reviews, or the Joker on the Sofa Reviews.
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