Season 1, Episode 2 "The Secret of the Old Morgue" Review/Opinions

I planned on watching each episode 3 times before writing a review, but for this episode, I could only get myself to watch it twice. It just didn't really capture my interest. I didn't dislike the episode, I just didn't like it as much as I liked the pilot. And in all honesty that could really just be because it didn't have as many "Easter Eggs" from the books, which is one of the things I'm most excited about. But don't just assume that it was a bad episode just because it didn't peak my interest much, hear me out! Also, I won't be going into details of the plot of the episode, just my thoughts about it, and I'm most likely not going to be talking about the episode in order, I'll just be writing down my thoughts as I think of them, so hopefully its not too confusing! haha

Nancy saw the ghost of Dead Lucy a lot in this episode, and I'm trying to not be super negative about there being a real ghost in this show. As all of us Nancy Drew book and game fans know, the ghosts are never real and Nancy always proves that to be so. However, occasionally it is hinted in the books and games that the ghost IS real. And in this new show, to me it seems as if the ghost isn't really a part of this mystery, and instead Dead Lucy is simply trying to get Nancy to solve her murder. Which...I think I'm okay with! After all, Nancy kind of needs a push to solve the mystery, since the only reason why she's trying to solve Tiffany's murder is to clear her own name. If it takes a ghost to get Nancy back into solving mysteries, then so be it...as long as the ghost doesn't end up being the culprit...which I don't think it will be. I'm starting to suspect that the person who killed Dead Lucy, is the same person who killed Tiffany.

I really liked how in this episode, we start to kind of see Nancy and Carson's relationship improve, she begins to have faith in him again, and he begins to open up to her and be more honest with her. Or so she thinks. I was super happy about the way their relationship was headed and relieved with his explanation on why he had a bloody dress in their attic...until the scene where we saw Carson burning the dress, clearly indicating that it actually was Dead Lucy's dress. However, I have a feeling that it will be revealed that Carson actually has a good reason for hiding the dress. Maybe his wife got caught up in something that she didn't intend to, maybe she witnessed Lucy's murder...who knows. Maybe it'll even be revealed that Nancy's mom was a spy, like she was in Her Interactive's game "The Silent Spy". I'm very interested to see what they do with this story line...I just hope Carson doesn't end up being a bad guy (although I feel like whatever he's hiding, he's doing it to protect Nancy).

When Nancy went to go break into the morgue...I loved how she said that she's been good at lock picking since she was 14, that was cute, and I like how they acknowledged that since its modern times, Nancy can't necessarily pick locks to get into places anymore, and now has to find another way to do it. At first it irritated me that she got caught breaking in, BUT then I started thinking about how this is the first time Nancy has had to break into a building with security this tight. So she's bound to make a mistake. This version of Nancy isn't perfect (which I like), and so her getting caught the first time she tries breaking into a place without an old fashioned lock makes sense. This situation also allowed for her and George to bond. I was really happy to see them begin to become friends and to look out for each other. Fans have been so upset that the 3 girls aren't friends in this show, but they don't seem to think about how this show is clearly like an introduction to Nancy. I really like seeing how the trio become friends, since we never got to see that in the books. Nancy and George have begun to see that they can trust each other and depend on one another. I'm also very happy that George finally saw the light about Ryan, and seems to be done with him (I also loved how after Nancy confronted George about Ryan, she admitted that she learned how to read lips online...such a Nancy Drew thing to do). And I loved the scene in the police station where Nancy asked Karen for a cup of coffee just so that she could take a peek at her computer. That was such a Nancy Drew thing for her to do. On the computer, she finds out that Tiffany was texting an unknown number right before she died (loved that Nancy wrote it on her shirt, so typical for her!), and later when Nancy tries calling that number, we see the the number was Ned's...so that's super interesting since Tiffany was the eye witness in the supposed manslaughter case that Ned was convicted in...so why is Ned talking to her? We know from an earlier scene that, according to Carson, Ned has no idea that Tiffany was the eye witness....so this is definitely intriguing. I also love how Ned clearly has feelings for Nancy, and it seems like she's finally allowing herself to have feelings for him too and finally trusting him, after her conversation with her father, but when she finds out that Tiffany was texting him right before she died......that could all be undone :(

Now onto the storyline with Bess and Ace. I LOVE their friendship. I'm kind of sad that they don't have anything romantic going on, but that could change. Although it was revealed that Bess likes girls, in my opinion it kinda seemed like they were hinting that she's bi, so I don't know, they could still have a romance in the future! Speaking of Bess liking girls, it felt SUPER random to me. When Bess and Ace were trying to distract Lisbeth from going into the morgue, and Bess and Lisbeth were looking at the car engine, I really thought Bess was just trying to distract her, it didn't seem like anything more to me, other than Lisbeth being interested in her. It seemed to me that Bess was taking advantage of the fact that Lisbeth seemed to be interested in her, in order to really distract her from leaving. So in the scene with Bess and Ace talking about it, and how he was saying "I get it" and how he was cool with being platonic friends with her..I was SO confused! Then when Bess said that she doesn't date anyone, Boys OR girls, I was like "that's what that scene was about?" I just felt like it wasn't executed very well...but that could just be me. While I wish she wasn't a lesbian, since she was always extremely boy crazy in the books (thats why I really didn't like how she said she doesn't really date anyone), I'm just glad they didn't make George the lesbian, since (like I said in the pilot review) that would just be playing into a stereotype, which isn't okay. If she does finally decide to text Lisbeth to ask her out (ALSO weird that her name is Lisbeth because obviously that's short for Elizabeth....and Bess is also short for Elizabeth haha), won't it be kind of awkward if they date since Bess's "friend" broke into the place where Lisbeth works? Like Lisbeth will probably have seen who it was who broke in, haha I don't know, I do really like Lisbeth though, so seems cool!

The only nod to the books I noticed in this episode was the blue roadster. I'm not totally sure this car could be classified as a roadster, but I absolutely love that they're making it her mom's car that is now being handed down to her!

I know the people behind the show have said that each episode will have a different mystery, with the one big mystery throughout the season, but so far we haven't really seen that. So it'll be interesting to see if that actually does happen...I hope it does!

Final Thoughts: I think we're slowly but surely going to see the characters become more like the characters we know and love from the books! I loved that Nancy's character is so similar to her original personality from the 30s, before she was made into more of a goody two shoes. But I do think we'll begin to see more of that personality shine through from time to time. Ned is also kind of bland in my opinion, just like he was in the books, but I am starting to like him better! I also am really liking George, she's a lot like her book character. Bess is also more like her book character, personality wise, than I expected. I'm interested to see what she's hiding and where they take her character, since that aspect is so different from the books. I'm hoping that we'll soon get to see Nancy and Bess bond, since we got to see Nancy and George bond in this episode. And then hopefully soon the three of them will bond all together. This is the first episode that has a title to it, since the pilot was just titled, "Pilot". This one was entitled "The Secret of the Old Morgue", and the next episode is entitled, "The Curse of the Dark Storm". I love that each episode sounds like the title of a Nancy Drew book!! Even though I wasn't super into this episode, it did flow better than the pilot, although it did feel a little flat to me. But I know that it often takes a season or 2 for a show to really find it's voice and style, so I'm excited to see what the next episode has in store!! Also I noticed that Nancy's hair is slightly more strawberry blonde, rather than full on blonde, and I'm liking it!

Side note: Apparently there's a character in episode 4, "The Haunted Ring", named Laura Tandy, which is clearly a nod to Russel Tandy, who was one of the artists for the book covers! Anyone who says that they slapped the name Nancy Drew on this show just to get people to watch, clearly doesn't know much, because the people behind this show very obviously did a lot of research on the history of Nancy Drew!

What did you guys think of episode 2?