# Sharp Objects (2018)

> A troubled small-town reporter returns to her Missouri hometown to investigate the murders of two girls and confronts the damage of her own childhood.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/61608

## Facts

- Seasons: 1
- Episodes: 8
- Episode runtime: 54 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: crime, drama, mystery
- Created by: Marti Noxon
- Network: HBO
- Cast: Amy Adams, Patricia Clarkson, Chris Messina, Eliza Scanlen, Matt Craven, Henry Czerny, Taylor John Smith, Madison Davenport
- TMDB rating: 8.0/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2649356/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: slow
- Intensity: strong
- Complexity: layered
- Violence: moderate
- Tone: brooding, claustrophobic, melancholic, tense, unsettling

## What critics say

Critics praise Amy Adams's performance and the atmospheric, beautifully shot Southern Gothic mood while faulting its slow pacing and overlong runtime.

## Synopsis

Sharp Objects (2018) is an American HBO psychological mystery limited series created by Marti Noxon. Amy Adams plays Camille Preaker, a damaged alcoholic reporter for a St. Louis newspaper who returns to her small hometown in Missouri to cover the murders of two young girls. Patricia Clarkson plays her controlling, socially polished mother Adora Crellin, and Eliza Scanlen plays her half-sister Amma, whose rebellious behavior unsettles the household. Chris Messina plays the local detective Richard Willis, who becomes an uneasy ally. Across eight hour-long episodes, the engine of the story is Camille's struggle to extract the truth from a town that protects its secrets, while her own memories of childhood trauma resurface in flashbacks and her body bears the marks of self-harm. Each episode peels back another layer of a wealthy, decaying family and a community that has learned to look away. The tone is brooding, claustrophobic and humid, with long, unsettling silences and a dread that builds steadily rather than through jump scares. Fans of Twin Peaks, True Detective and Big Little Lies will find resonance in its atmospheric small town unease and its focus on fractured women and buried family history.

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