Summary
As a direct continuation, season 2 is a full-bodied experience — it’s a revenge thriller that gets better and better.
This review of Netflix’s Bitter Daisies season 2 contains no spoilers. The second season was released on the streaming service on April 2, 2021.
I’m usually quite snotty with a TV series that divulges in nearly feature-length episodes, but in the case of Netflix’s Bitter Daisies, it gets away with it due to its richness and direction — season 2 follows in the same vein. It’s quite an intoxicating experience. It zeroes in on the lead character (Eva) effortlessly, eyeing up every emotion, decision and hesitation that she has; the lead character is a tough one to crack — the series toils with “justice or revenge” after the events of the first season.
And the “justice or revenge” theme is so addictive — when writers get it right, it can consume the viewer into an all-encompassing experience. There has to be a strong emphasis on a character’s morals and whether straying on either side matches their development. That’s important in television; you cannot throw the theme in without storyboarding the purpose of the main characters. This is why Tell Me Your Secrets failed; the audience had no idea what each character truly was, and instead, the writers bamboozled the audience with plenty of evolving cliff-hangers that did not add up. Bitter Daisies is different in that respect; it slow burns on a central plot point without diseasing the subplots to an extreme degree.
As a direct continuation, season 2 is a full-bodied experience — it’s a revenge thriller that gets better and better. Eva, the police and the other supporting characters navigate a world of complexity, reeking of filthy men, with a serial killer rummaging below the undergrowth. Eva has a desperate agenda in season 2, after learning that Rebeca is captured by the same establishment that organised Murias; the cyclical sexual abuse of minors is continuing.
There’s a motive, and there’s an act of deep-rooted revenge that runs in the lead character’s mind. It veils over the story and keeps the viewer at arm’s length as more secrets are uncovered and the main players in the narrative come to light. There’s plenty of personal struggle in season 2; there’s a past that shines stronger than in season 1 that props everything that the series is about.
At six chapters long, Bitter Daisies season 2 sticks to the same format, with a similar approach in direction and a cast that has embraced the script with a degree of focus. This is certainly a series that is a hidden gem and deserves so much more watch-time internationally.
