Guilty Party (Episode 10)

Rebecca Addelman has more proven that she can take on chaotic crime dramedies as a writer behind the excellent “Dead to Me.” But when it comes to “Guilty Party,” the new Paramount+ series she created starring Kate Beckinsale, she has totally fumbled the ball.It’s not just that “Guilty Party” is bad (though it is). It’s entirely unfocused and Addelman and her writing team don’t seem to know what exactly they want the show to be. It starts off intriguing enough with a flawed protagonist named Beth Burgess (Beckinsale), a journalist who is accused of falsifying a quote in a story moments after receiving an award for it. She says she was framed. Her shady superior isn’t backing her up. It sets up an interesting drama about a woman, one who obviously has investigative abilities, determined to find out who did this to her and why. Then, to clear her name.Guilty Party Season 1 Download

Except, “Guilty Party” isn’t that. Beth loses her job and falls into a personal and professional depression, taking on a pride-swallowing position as a writer at a publication where she reports to a millennial (Madeleine Arthur) more interested in Harry Potter memes than serious crime stories. While it gives way to a few humorous moments between the older and younger women, this is mostly empty fodder that could have been better spent establishing the more compelling narrative.In its second episode, “Guilty Party” attempts to pull a neat little meta trick of admitting its own wrongs through the mouth of a skeptical character. As disgraced journalist Beth (Kate Beckinsale) pitches a story about Toni (Jules Latimer), a young Black mother serving a life sentence for a crime she insists she didn’t commit, Beth’s young boss Amber (Madeleine Arthur) cocks a skeptical eyebrow. “I don’t know,” Amber says. “It sounds a bit ‘white savior-y’ to me.” Amber might be wary of any story that can’t be written in listicle format, but her instincts about Beth, at least, are spot on. In trying to restore her reputation after an unceremonious firing for fabricating a quote (a charge Beth vehemently denies), Beth clings to the idea of telling Toni’s story in such a way that everyone would have to admit that she is, in fact, a journalist worth celebrating.