Solstice, the latest addition to the Slasher anthology series on Netflix, is a hard series to review. Whether or not you will like it depends on what qualities you feel make a good slasher flick. Though the #SlasherSolstice tweets are now generally positive, when I watched it last week there was a lot more disagreement.
It has some memorable scenes, and a heavy dosage of gore, but ultimately I could take it or leave it. I’m going go give my mostly spoiler free thoughts here to help you decide if you should watch or not.
Premise
A year ago an amorous bisexual partier was murdered at an apartment complex by “The Druid” and the building’s residents watched without trying to help. A year later The Druid returns and starts murdering the residents of the building.
Length
The season is only 8 episodes so it is fairly short. Each 45 minute episode shows us what happens to the characters in a three hour period with a bunch of flashbacks built in to further develop the characters.
Characters
The main characters of the series are Saadia, her best friend Jen, and Saadia’s love interest Conner. The series makes it very clear that Saadia, a religious Muslim teenager, will be “final girl”. She is a goodie two shoes who thinks the best of everyone. I found her optimism hard to believe considering the amount of racism and violence she has experienced in her life. Her best friends are a pair of African American siblings, with two mothers, who are also subjected to a lot of abuse and discrimination. Most of the other characters we meet feel like nothing more than potential victims.
MINOR SPOILER ALERT
Some of the characters you meet:
- Kit: The initial victim, a hyper sexual drug addict.
- Cassidy: Promiscuous teenager and bully.
- Dan: The drunken, White Supremacist, single father of Cassidy .
- Amy: An asexual Professional Gamer.
- Xandar: Amy’s boyfriend and coffee shop owner.
- Violet: Sensationalist Blogger.
- Kaili: Failed actor turned biology teacher.
- Angel: Gay activist who had a relationship with Kit and an affair with Joe.
- Joe: Closeted bisexual who cannot decide who he wants to be with.
- Detective Roberta Hanson: The detective in charge of The Druid investigation
- Detective Pujit Singh: An inexperienced detective who works with Roberta.
- Frank: Mob connected car thief and family man.
- And a mix of other random people as well.
The series gets a lot of points for diversity of cast and characters. There are people of many nationalities and personalities. Unfortunately few of the characters are actually likable and with the entire series taking a single day there is little room for growth.
Death Scenes
The death scenes are gory, more so than I like. Many of them cross into the realm of torture instead of murder. It feels like the series is targeting fans of Saw, Hostel, or other torture driven films. Most of the deaths reflect the character’s interaction with the original victim somehow. Those which don’t are tailored towards the character’s personality. My biggest complaint is that the deaths don’t really fit with The Druid’s motivation. It feels like the point of how they died was to break the fourth wall and divert the viewers’ suspicion away from the killer. I can’t give away more without spoilers, so if you want more info ask in the comments.
If you like gore and torture you will probably enjoy the death scenes. They do provide some solid variety from other shows. That being said I could take them or leave them.
The Killer
I found the killer to be much too obvious. They did try and throw us off a bit, both with the nature of the murders, and by using a very common twist, but still all other suspects were quickly eliminated. The killer had a believable motivation and didn’t have villain armor. They caught their victims by surprise and then killed them without a dramatic fight.
My Verdict
The series was well done and worth watching, but it was certainly wasn’t my favorite. It was good for fans of gore and non-supernatural slasher movies. It’s diverse cast was one of its strongest points. If it had made them more sympathetic it could have been really good. The fact that it took place over a single day was also a nice touch. Ultimately whether or not you will enjoy it depends on what you are looking for from a slasher. I recommend it to fans of the genre though the squeamish should avoid it.
Originally published at https://www.narrative.org on June 3, 2019.
