It’s a show that is not likely to be on many people’s radar, but at the moment, it’s got a perfect Rotten Tomatoes score, netting a win for Netflix.
The 100%-scoring show is The Dead Girls, a show that has only barely hit the top 10 in Netflix’s list, currently at #10, but has hooked the critics who have seen it. The show is a limited series, a Mexican show based on a book by Jorge Ibargüengoitia. Here’s how it was described by Salman Rushdie:
“This is the first appearance in English of a Mexican novelist of enormous talent. His brilliant novel is based on fact: the discovery in the yard of a small-town brothel of the corpses of six prostitutes. In the laconic tones of a police report, Ibargüengoitia investigates the murders and their motives, the society and the profession – the oldest of all, but no less mysterious for that – which precipitated them. But this is no dry work of sociology or criminology; it is a work of fiction, a black comedy both moving and cruelly funny, a potent and entertaining blend of sex and mayhem…”
On top of that, this is also based on a true story of Las Poquianchis, a family of serial killers back in the 1960s. The show is six episodes, but a lengthy watch given that all of them range from 60 to 80 minutes, meaning this is as much as an investment as some other shows might be if they were 12 episodes, kind of a rarity for Netflix.
This is a limited series, based on a book, based on real events, so no, there is no search for a sequel season going on here in terms of the viewership it may or may not get. I’m not sure if it will move up the top 10 list or drop off, but if it’s this good, word of mouth may spread and it could become a higher-profile foreign show for Netflix, who was wise to scoop this up, it seems. Here’s what some of the critics are saying about it:
- El Universal: “The structure of the series works with such precision that it not only creates the need to keep watching episode after episode, but Estrada also turns each chapter into a genre-bending film.”
- LeisureByte: “The Dead Girls is an engaging but heartbreaking series about two ruthless sisters who reek of desperation and greed.”
Whether The Dead Girls retains its 100% as more reviews come in remains to be seen, but regardless, it’s certainly something to seek out even if it may disappear off Netflix’s list and is not a hugely featured program on the service. Enjoy.
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