Summary
Things continue to go wrong for Alice in this determinedly bizarre show, but its willingness to throw everything at the wall and see what sticks remains compelling enough.
This Finding Alice season 1, episode 4 recap contains spoilers.
You have to respect Finding Alice for two reasons. The first is that it is content to be thoroughly bizarre, sometimes against its own interests. It might work better as a drama about unpacking grief, or a mystery about an inheritance coup, or a thriller about highly shady business dealings if the tone did not flip-flop all over the place. But the reason it does, mostly, is because of the character of Alice, which is another reason why you should cut it some slack. It’s rare that a TV show is content to have a protagonist who is probably too actively self-destructive and openly hostile for an audience to get behind. But Alice is both of those things, yet I can’t help but root for her all the same, if only because she has the gall to tell other characters what the audience is probably thinking, such as when she tells one of the mourners at Nathan’s bereavement group that he’s a bit annoying. He is, after all. More people could stand to hear the truth.
Given all of the other stuff that happens in Finding Alice episode 4, this is light stuff. Of particular note is the fact Alice, still desperate for cash, sells off her smart home’s kitchen to a fellow member of the bereavement group who clearly has ulterior motives. She also tells that bereavement group about the financial hardships of your partner dying unmarried and leaving behind a wealth of personal and professional problems, including bank accounts that can’t be accessed, passwords that can’t be guessed, and a potentially lucrative land deal that has nonetheless been stymied by the council over supposed contamination.
There’s no wonder, really, that Alice spends a night in a tent by Harry’s grave – why not, at this point? Him being buried in the garden, by the way, is seemingly doing nothing to put off potential buyers, and neither is Alice hilariously spraying them with a garden hose. Joe Bannister plays William, the estate agent, and probably deserves more credit for how capably he sells Alice’s madcap behavior while still trying to move the property.
The knock-on effects of Harry’s death also seem to be causing a cascade of calamities for everyone else in Finding Alice season 1, episode 4, which certainly doesn’t help. Alice’s mother and father are clinging onto their marriage by a thread, her in-laws are desperate to sell the house from under her, and creepy George is clearly after something or other. This is, obviously, too much for a serious study of grief to take root amongst it all, but I think Finding Alice has long-since given up on trying to be that. It’s very much its own strange, flawed thing, and I’d very much take that over yet another samey thriller.
