Candy Episode 4 “Cover Girl” Review – Breathing Room Makes the Series Grow Colder
If you haven’t read my review of the first three episodes, click here to read it, as it contains much of my criticism of the series thus far.
Picking up a day after the incident, this episode follows Candy Montgomery as an investigation into the matter closes in around her. Simultaneously, Allan comes home from his business trip with 3M to help with the investigation as well as process the aftermath of the incident.
This concept should have been a wonderful episode, but it left me wanting. There are moments relating to Candy’s sheer panic about being found out that don’t quite hit as hard as they should, given that this panic feels like it’s happening way too late after the incident. Furthermore, given the series’ trajectory towards unveiling what happened in the incident (something I’ll touch a bit more on in my review of the finale), what the viewer gets here is table scraps. At most, we get peeks at the incident that Collin County Officer Steven Deffibaugh (Justin Timberlake!) walks through. There’s nothing inherently wrong with the narrative of the episode, it does its job. It deals very much with the fallout, but at this point in the series, I wished we also got more insight into the incident.
The pain point this brings up is exemplified by Allan Gore’s storyline in this episode. As I said before, much of this episode focuses on Candy’s panic about the investigation. I get why we have to focus on her (the series is named after her), but it feels like a missed opportunity to focus further on Allan’s grief. Outside of a few glimpses in previous episodes, we don’t get to see very much of him in the series. When we do, it has been concerning another character. That doesn’t feel fair to the real-life Alan Gore and getting to portray his grief if he never gets the chance to. I don’t know if Robin Veith, Nick Antosca, or Elise Brown were more interested in Candy’s evolution as a character or what, but I wish Allan had more screentime in this episode.
That said, we get amazing performances all around in the episode. Specifically from Timothy Simons, Raúl Esparza, Timberlake as Pat Montogomery, Don Crowder, and Deffibaugh, respectively. I don’t have the time to get into all their performances, so I’ll be brief. Simons’ performance as Pat Montgomery is probably my favorite, particularly in a scene outdoors that I won’t spoil. He’s given far more to do here than in any other episode, and he sells Candy’s evolution from stay-at-home mom into what she’s known as today. Esparza’s performance as Don Crowder wasn’t necessarily my favorite, but I thought it was worth mentioning that he gets to have some fantastic scenes where he’s allowed to inject some humor into what is an otherwise drab episode. Timberlake’s performance as Collin County Officer Deffibaugh is likewise as charming, although he gets moments of intense horror mixed with curiosity.
With good comes the bad, I suppose. Every ounce of artistic style that Benjamin Semanoff injected into the previous episode, titled “Overkill”, is missing here. Director Tara Nicole Weyr (whose work largely comprises of reality television such as Desperate Housewives) feels as though she’s not directing the episode, but getting notes from showrunners Veith & Antosca to make the episode’s pacing feel like molasses at points. It’s unfortunate, but that’s TV sometimes.
If you are looking for a compelling lead-in to the series finale of Candy, maybe keep an eye on Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness star Elizabeth Olsen’s upcoming miniseries about Candy Montgomery, Love and Death, later this year on HBO Max.
★★★
Candy episode four will be available to stream on Hulu starting tonight. You can watch episodes one through three now.
Until next time!
Thanks to Thomas Stoneham-Judge from Movies For Reel, Shane Conto, Joseph Davis, David Walters, Ambula Bula, and Matthew Simpson for supporting Austin B Media on Patreon!
