An overhead shot of a beach resort bleeds into a head-on shot of a jungle with the two main characters walking down a dirt road.

About:

Title: The Resort (Season #1)
Released: 2022

Fix: Mysteries, Shows That Can Be Funny And Sad, Great Casts, You Loved The Quirkiness of Palm Springs And Cristin Milioti, You Loved The Vibe Of Lost (Put Aside The Ending, Good Or Bad, Mmmkay?), You Don’t Mind Letting A Story Unfold At Its Pace
Platform: Peacock

Peacock Summary:

Exploring love and the weird things we do in the name of it, encased in an elaborate true-crime conspiracy.

FYA Summary:

Please pay attention to the items listed in the Fix, because if you disliked one or all of those things then you probably won’t like this. If, however, all of that sounds effing awesome, well, then, let me tell you about a cool new show!

Emma and Noah just arrived to their beach resort for their wedding anniversary, and they spend their first day doing all sorts of typical vacation stuff, including an ATV tour through the jungle. Emma takes a turn too fast and rolls ass over teakettle down a hill, luckily landing in a pile of leaves to break her fall…a pile of leaves that contains a phone. And not just any smartphone—it’s a beat-up Motorola Razr circa 2007. Emma is instantly obsessed with figuring out what secrets the device is hiding, and what she finds shocks her: she’s holding the phone of Sam, a young man who went missing from the same area fifteen years ago, along with another hotel guest named Violet.

What happened to Sam? How did he know Violet? What is going on with Emma and Noah’s relationship? And most importantly: why does it feel like somehow, some way, everything seems to be connected?

Familiar Faces:

Cristin Milioti as Emma

William Jackson Harper as Noah

Is it a pre-requisite of Milioti’s that any show she’s in must have some element of flashbacks or time-weirdness? Because this is becoming her niche, and I don’t hate it. Cristin has such an expressive face and she says volumes without making a sound. At first Emma is a tough character to understand, and her actions often made me side-eye her, but once she’s cracked open you begin to sympathize with her (even if she does still annoy me at times).

Aside from its premise, WJH is the reason I wanted to watch this show. I adored him as Chidi in The Good Place and I think he’s such a delight on screen. I feel for Noah as a man who obviously loves his very head-strong wife but can clearly see the cracks forming in his relationship and feels immobilized and lost on how to stop it.

Luis Gerardo Méndez as Baltasar

I’m unfamiliar with Luis, but after watching him on this show I really hope to see more of him! He slips from mysterious to earnest and funny or intense with ease, and there is something magnetic about him that makes you want to watch him (I mean, yes, he’s hot, but there’s ALSO something else, that X factor). His facial structure and his acting in this character also kind of remind me of Alan Cumming, another strangely magnetic actor—anyone else see that?

Skyler Gisondo as Sam

This guy has been in a bunch of things here and there (like he played Young Shawn in Psych or Howard Stacy in The Amazing Spider-Man movies) but I had to run to IMDB to confirm when he opened his mouth because it was a funny coincidence – I had just finished playing a video game called The Quarry (which I def recommend if you love summer-camp horror stories and choose-your-own-adventure gameplay) in which he was one of the main characters; his face/voice are very distinctive and the game captured him really well. Anyway, we get flashbacks to Sam’s own vacation in the Yucatan and there’s something really earnest and sweet about Sam that instantly made me like him. (Sam hurts his neck crashing his skateboard early on and I applaud Skyler’s body acting: it’s a small thing, but he commits to stiffly holding his head and neck in such a way that you’re always reminded his character has this injury.)

Nina Bloomgarden as Violet

This looks to be one of Nina’s first roles but like Méndez I hope to see more of her because she is gorgeous and she immediately draws your eye to her when she’s on screen. Violet and Sam have great, instant chemistry, and I completely believed why they would be drawn to each other in such a short time span.

Nick Offerman as Murray

Fun fact: my husband loves Nick Offerman so much that he once put on one of those holiday fireplace videos where Nick Offerman just sits there looking at you and drinking Scotch and he, like, watched it and also drank a Scotch with him (they both love the same Lagavulin distillery in Scotland). Anyway! I, too, enjoy Nick’s acting, and his character, Murray, is particularly tragic. As Violet’s father, he not only faces the loss of his daughter while on their vacation, but the entire reason for the trip was because it was the one-year anniversary of the loss of his wife.

Couch-Sharing Capability: High

I wish we’d all watched this together on MY couch, because if we had we could be talking about it right now, and, gah, there is so much I want to say but I shouldn’t because I don’t want to rob you of learning of if yourself. So suffice to say—watch with someone else if you can!

Recommended Level of Inebriation: Walk The Line

If you care at all about putting together the mystery aspects of The Resort then you should probably stay sober. It’s only eight episodes long, so it’s not exactly “slow”, but the reveals aren’t always flash-bangs in your face, and you’re going to finish some episodes not knowing what the heck is going on; embrace it! In fact, once you get done with the season you may want to restart with fresh eyes to put together what you missed.

Use of Your Streaming Subscription: Excellent

I haven’t used my Peacock subscription much because there isn’t a lot of their newer content that interests me, but as soon as I heard about this show via a great movie/TV creator I trust (go check out @jstoobs on TikTok), I knew I had to watch this. I love the prospect of there being something timey-wimey happening, and say what you will about the execution, but I loved the storytelling of Lost where we slowly learn about how all these characters connect and the poignant reveals of their backstories. Add in a fantastic cast and some genuinely amusing/heartbreaking moments, and, baby, you got yourself a stew.

It IS a bit of a bummer that as of right now there is no word yet on a second season, but I have hope! Luckily, without spoiling anything, I think this first season DOES wrap up the major mysteries and if this is all we have, then overall I think it was a mostly satisfying conclusion, but I can definitely see where there is more to explore.

Stephanie (she/her) is an avid reader who moonlights at a college and calls Orlando home. Stephanie loves watching television, reading DIY blogs, planning awesome parties, Halloween decorating, and playing live-action escape games.