Netflix The Stranger - Anyone up for discussion with spoilers?

[Dennisreynoldsduster]

Just finished it and I’m curious to see what people thought - with SPOILERS allowed so don’t read on if you haven’t seen it or haven’t finished it!

I liked it, but the acting was shit. And the ending was an anti climax. Too many stories that were completely unrelated happening at the same time. I was waiting for them to all be linked in some way, but they didn’t! Jennifer Saunders died for nothing! Although glad she did :D

Just finished it tonight.
I though it was good up until the ending.
I love Siobhan Finneran though, she can do no wrong.

I haven't read the rest of the thread yet.

I found it engaging enough but pretty silly. Way too many enormous plot holes and daft characters. And did Ingrid Risby die? And the only reference to it was "sorry about your friend". I was also very distracted by the varying amounts of curl and length of curl in Jo's hair from scene to scene. Also, it was shot in spring and mid-summer. But the final scene (at the football ground) was also on a brilliant, sunny summers day and captioned "6 months later". I don't know about you but I'd love to live in a country where it's summer for 6 months of the year!

The teens storyline didn't add much did it - other than a not so subtle anti drugs message.

DH and I couldn't work out why Adam became convinced that Killan was connected with the detective agency in some way? If he was he would have known about his daughter?

Also, how did she (the stranger) just vanish into thin air at the end of the railway sidings scene? She had been just feet away from him.

Too many questions - means that in the end I'd have to put this series in the load of old twaddle category .

Unsatisfactory in so many ways. I enjoyed the first episode but then it became a different storyline after that.
I wanted to know why the Dervla Kirwan character faked the pregnancy (I know it was prob to stop his affair but the husband didn't even think she knew at that point in story). I want to know why she wouldn't talk about it straightaway and why she said there was more to it than the husband knew. I want to know why she didn't tell her husband about Tripp embezzling the money at any point.

I feel like it was set up with this main character (Dervla Kirwan) and this interesting though somewhat unbelievable event (faking a pregnancy) in the first episode but then that was completely swallowed up and we never got any real answers. Very unsatisfying.

People were raving about this Facebook. They wrote how amazing the ending was.

As soon as I heard the British accents I was disappointed.

I cant understand how they thought it would make a good series for Netflix.

Maybe bbc but non of it made sense and most of the story lines were pointless.

She faked the pregnancy because her and her husband were drifting apart and she thought he was having an affair. She got the idea from meeting the woman who was a serial pregnancy faker that the husband tracked down. That woman was also being blackmailed by ‘the stranger’.

Oh what a let down.

It started out so well!

And what was all the crap abut the kids & the alpaca??!!

It was entertaining but also very annoying.

The end was v implausible - the alpaca boy's dad was shot dead, and he was best friends with the boy who's Mum was murdered (by alpaca boy's dad) - you'd think he'd have been affected. but no they are there looking relatively happy at the football 6 months later & no mention of his poor friend alpaca boy.

And the stuff about the mum with Munchausens syndrome - what was the point in that?

I just finished this and enjoyed it

Not sure how they got away with the ending. Who supposedly found Corinne (?) (the wife - is that her name?) because I don’t know how the story makes sense if Adam found her there along with dead Trip?? What?

I enjoyed it though

Need something new! Any recommendations? I might go for Unbelievable

Agree with all the plot holes mentioned already and just have one more to add..or maybe not so much a plot hole but another pointless ‘fact’ that went nowhere. So when the detectives are analysing the dead alpaca there was a human bite mark on the leg, they work out that whoever bit the alpaca had a tooth missing. Ok...and then what? That was literally NEVER MENTIONED AGAIN!

It was mentioned again. They deduced it couldn't have been Dante (?)

"And the stuff about the mum with Munchausens syndrome - what was the point in that?"

Because Katz thought that Olivia was ill & was desperate to find the 2 blackmailers so that he would be paid by the guy who had been seeing Heidi's daughter & be able to find treatment abroad for Olivia.

Not yet finished but marking my place

I still don’t really get why Katz killed Heidi. How did he know she had any involvement with the stranger and In any event shooting her seemed a massive overreaction - what did he expect her to know and how was killing her going to help when it became clears she didn't know anything?! It just seems a bit implausible that a cop (albeit a slightly unhinged one) would blow someone’s head off with a shotgun because he didn’t get enough info out of her. I know he was desperate but clearly murdering someone was only going to land him a world of shit 😆

Also the body found in killane’s house would surely have been a skeleton given how long ago he killed her?! The size and shape of it was just a normal body.

And totally agree with PP re the alpaca storyline - pointless and random, and started to get really tedious after a while.

Overall I enjoyed it but it was pretty far fetched and too many plot lines - munchausens, blackmail, affairs, embezzlement, fake pregnancies, random alpaca decapitations...

I enjoyed it

The next thing I watched was Liar on ITV which I enjoyed just as much - in case anyone is looking for anything else to watch!

I really enjoyed it. Did I miss whether Adam resolved the stranger's initial comment that he wasn't the biological father of his two boys? He bought a DNA test, then binned it. Presumably it was true?

Can you really buy DNA tests over the counter like that?

The stranger started off well but throughout there was too many plot holes and the ending was rubbish.

Safe however followed a very good plot line and all made sense in the end. If you liked the stranger, give safe a go, much better

I also think that the killing of Heidi seemed ott.

Hadn't Katz seen her chatting with the 2 blackmailers so didn't believe that she didn't know them?

It did seem, er, overkill though!

I think it was one of those things where you were just shouting "just tell them".

All the bollocks about stuff being too complicated to tell!

Corinne admitted to faking the pregnancy, but saying that Tripp had stolen money & was blackmailing her was a step too far??!!

What is also annoying is that I've read loads of thrillers with fewer plot holes (surely they all have some!) that would make great TV shows buy they choose dodgy stuff like this instead.

I thought it was mostly watchable but the end was rushed and utterly crap.

I think the most unbelievable part of all was Tripp’s expectation that Adam would keep Schtum about him killing Corinne (and showing him her dead cold body!) and continue living across the road like nothing had happened - and why? On the vague statement that they’d just think Adam had done it!!
Bonkers programme. And lots of “Tracey beaker” type acting.

I know Nicola Shindler who produced it. She’s from bury - hence all the filming there and when I knew her she lived in Bolton.

As soon as hermit man said his child was called Chris I knew we were meant to assume boy, therefore it was a girl, therefore the stranger.(

When she showed up and said, "Hi Dad", I thought, "Oh, he's got two kids."

Yappity, I might try Safe on your suggestion!