Dear Edward takes a predictable path to boredom [Apple TV+ recap]

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Colin O’Brien, left, and Taylor Schilling look haggard in a scene from boring Apple TV+ drama ☆☆☆
The makeup crew owes actors Colin O’Brien, left, and Taylor Schilling an apology!
Photo: Apple TV+

TV+ ReviewThis week on Dear Edward, the Apple TV+ series about the daisy chain of grief that connects dozens of people after a plane crash, survivor Edward learns that his dead brother had a secret girlfriend.

Dee Dee and her daughter have a heart-to-heart that reveals a strained relationship. Kojo and Adriana dance around each other on their way to a relationship. Lacey tries to be a mom. Amanda and Steve make some mistakes. And Edward has a falling out with Shay.

The episode, entitled “Haunted,” doesn’t prove quite as headache-inducing as last week’s. Nevertheless, Dear Edward insists on screenwriting 101 at every turn.

Dear Edward recap: ‘Haunted’

Season 1, episode 5: Amanda (played by Brittany S. Hall) is going through the plane crash debris record and happens upon the engagement ring that Brent (James Chen) tried to give her minutes before boarding the doomed plane. It’s the first thing of his she’s received since the crash, aside from condolences from his brother, Steve (Ivan Shaw).

Things get complicated when Steve’s fiance (Clara Wong) shows up and it’s clear that Steve hasn’t been sharing many of the details about his dead brother’s life with her. Amanda’s embarrassed when she gets an invite to dinner, and Steve is, too. Why? Who could say? We learn in flashbacks that Brent struggled with a bad drug addiction and boarded the plane to check into a rehab program. Not really the kind of thing you spring on your fiance, if you ask me, but hey, whatever. Moving on.

Edward (Colin O’Brien) and Shay (Eva Ariel Binder) are hanging out at lunch when Shay makes a discovery. Last week, Edward gave Shay his brother Jordan’s (Maxwell Jenkins) old coat as a gesture of healing for himself, and she finds drawings inside. They’re not by Jordan, but somebody else. But who? Maybe it’s the spooky girl (Jenna Qureshi) who keeps writing Edward letters and giving him little clues whenever she sees him.

Edward hates the idea because he and Jordan weren’t supposed to keep secrets. (I don’t really buy this. Kids keep secrets all the time, especially teenagers, which Jordan was when he perished. Whatever. Moving on again.) Edward is furious with Shay at the suggestion that Jordan was hiding a girlfriend from him and leaves the table in a snit. They fight on and off for the next few days.

Time for some unpredictable parenting

Edward’s aunt/new foster parents Lacey and John (Taylor Schilling and Carter Hudson) are bummed because Edward is spending every night at Shay’s house. She decides to lay down the law a little and demands (nicely) that he not sleep at Shay’s anymore.

John sees that Edward’s hurting, so he offers him something to help. What if he went to the field where the plane went down and took pictures of it to show Edward there’s not still flaming wreckage and dead bodies everywhere? Edward loves that idea. (Me? I don’t get it at all. What does … that … have to do with anything? Whatever, moving on!)

Lacey hates that John is doing this, but she can’t stop him. The next morning, Edward asks to go with Lacey into the city so he can go look for the mystery girl. Edward has a flashback to a time with his brother that the directors and editors make look like they were on a date. He goes to the creepy girl’s uncle’s bodega (hilarious detail — the two extras on the street waiting to hear the word “action”). And she stonewalls him, tells him not to talk too loudly about Jordan in front of her uncle (Mahadeo Shivraj), and then makes him leave. So much for that.

Fun on the campaign trail

Anna Uzele faces the camera in a scene from "Dear Edward" on Apple TV+.
Adriana (played by Anna Uzele) faces uncomfortable questions.
Photo: Apple TV+

Meanwhile, Adriana (Anna Uzele) is being interviewed about her new congressional campaign and the question of her love life comes up — specifically, her fling with a local priest (Joshua Echebiri). Her houseguest with a crush Kojo (Idris Debrand) hears this and looks like his dog died. They talk about this later and almost kiss, but she gets a phone call and it spoils the mood.

The next day, the priest comes by to give her flowers while she isn’t home. Kojo is, though, and the two lock horns in true alpha male fashion. For a priest, our guy is kind of a huge, trash-talking, big-timing dickhead. Whatever. Moving on.

Adriana gets railroaded at the first debate when it turns out one of her opponents (Zachary Le Vey) is a comically evil real estate developer — subtle! But then she takes command and impresses the audience.

Like mother, like daughter

Dee Dee (Connie Britton) finally reconnects with her daughter, Zoe (Audrey Corsa), after visiting her dead husband Charlie’s (Ted Koch) Los Angeles apartment. She doesn’t want to go over all the stuff she learned in LA, so Zoe doesn’t pry. She brings up the idea of leaving school to travel, which Dee Dee hates

Zoe accuses her mom of not feeling enough, and Dee Dee hates that even more. But she must admit that there’s a kernel of truth to Zoe’s accusation that she’s been grooming her daughter to be just like her since she was little. Maybe it’s time to be spontaneous and see new things. And maybe Dee Dee could benefit from the same thing.

She confesses all the Charlie double life stuff to the group. Apparently, she and Charlie were together since they were 17. That makes all this even harder to swallow. She then says that she and Charlie were like best friends. OK … so how did you not suspect any of this other stuff? Linda (Amy Forsyth) asks Dee Dee if she wants to hang out, and Dee Dee’s response is, “I’m sorry, I can’t be your mom.” Smooth.

Meanwhile, at a Colorado bar …

John finally makes it to Colorado and happens into a bar that just happens to be where the meth addict park ranger (Joe Tippett) from Dear Eward’s dreadful first episode is having a midday beer and a shot. The park ranger agrees to take him to the crash sight. He’s drunk, so John’s a little hesitant to get into his truck, but he relents because no one else will take him or wants to talk to him.

John has an attack of grief and empathy while in the field. We don’t know him as a character, so I guess this is believable. He and the park ranger pray together despite not being religious — which could have been a powerful scene if directed with more care.

Steve and Amanda get a drink and commiserate some more and then wind up sleeping together. Couldn’t have seen that coming, could we?

Whatever, moving on

Colin O’Brien, left, and Taylor Schilling look haggard in a scene from boring Apple TV+ drama "Dear Edward."
The makeup crew owes actors Colin O’Brien, left, and Taylor Schilling an apology!
Photo: Apple TV+

Both Lacey and Edward remain caked in sleepless corpse makeup for some reason in this episode. It’s always very funny when they cut to Connie Britton or Anna Uzele and it’s like … why does everyone else get to look superheroically gorgeous, but these poor bastards look like death warmed over? I feel bad for them!

Ultimately, all the characters are suffering from the exact same grief over the exact same thing. Dear Edward just keeps hitting every single beat you expect it to, to the point where you can predict to the second what every character’s next outburst is going to be. This week’s episode wasn’t so belief-beggaring as last week’s, but it was twice as boring, so not exactly an improvement.

☆☆☆

Watch Dear Edward on Apple TV+

New episodes of Dear Edward arrive every Friday on Apple TV+.

Rated: TV-MA

Watch on: Apple TV+

Scout Tafoya is a film and TV critic, director and creator of the long-running video essay series The Unloved for RogerEbert.com. He has written for The Village Voice, Film Comment, The Los Angeles Review of Books and Nylon Magazine. He is the author of Cinemaphagy: On the Psychedelic Classical Form of Tobe Hooper, the director of 25 feature films, and the director and editor of more than 300 video essays, which can be found at Patreon.com/honorszombie.

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