Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
Little miss detective Pippa, AKA Pip, is 18 years old in ‘A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder 2’, ready to move on from sleuthing and swearing she won’t be a busybody anymore. But staying away from mysteries becomes impossible when the case involves the disappearance of the brother of one of her closest childhood friends.
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Based on the books by Holly Jackson, ‘A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder 2’ sees the original cast of season 1 reprise their roles, led by the feisty Emma Myers as protagonist Pip, while Zain Iqbal plays supportive boyfriend Ravi Singh.
Encouraged by friends and family, Pip starts a true crime podcast, and soon finds herself trying to solve a fresh missing case, as Connor’s (Jude Morgan-Collie) older brother Jamie (Eden H. Davies) goes missing under unusual circumstances. The timing is quite suspicious as Jamie was all set to appear as a key witness in an ongoing case against the wealthy Max Hastings (Henry Ashton).
And yes, watching the first season is pretty much mandatory here, since ‘A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder 2’ heavily continues the Max Hastings storyline, with the accused teen facing trial after Pip’s investigation into Andie Bell’s disappearance uncovered allegations of him drugging and raping multiple girls.
Just six episodes long, ‘A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder 2’ spends much of its opening episode exploring the emotional fallout of Pip solving the Andie Bell case, with her podcast attracting both praise and backlash. Her relationship with BFF Cara (Asha Banks) is also strained, even though the friend group does stick together at school.
The series adopts a noticeably darker tone this time around, stripping away much of the quirky small-town mystery charm that made the first season so enjoyable. The first half of the season focuses heavily on Pip’s clash with Max, as he intimidates victims and witnesses, threatening Pip with consequences too. So of course when Jamie goes missing, Pip is convinced Max has something to do with it, but he has a solid alibi to keep him in the clear. The only other clue? A catfish Max was chatting with.
Emma Myers still holds her own as the young protagonist, but Pip feels far more unrealistically larger-than-life this season. She remains just as reckless and overtly emotional, traits that felt charmingly messy in the first season, but now come across as more exhausting and irritating. Honestly, it’s a little strange that Pip isn’t in therapy, or that nobody preps her for her court appearance against Max Hastings.
Henry Ashton wickedly portrays Max’ smug, almost serial-killer-level menace, pointedly embodying the privileged predator who thinks money and status place him above consequences. But the actor also stands out far more this season because he has visibly aged, and at times looks old enough to be Pip’s overworked father rather than her classmate or a peer.
All that said, Emma Myers and Henry Ashton remain the only real standouts in ‘A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder 2’, although Annabel Mullion leaves a strong impression in her brief role as Max’s mother, Rosie Hastings. Initially coming across as an indulgent parent willing to ignore her son’s crimes, Rosie eventually finds the courage to challenge him, only to later shrink under his intimidation. There is an interesting underlying idea there about women gradually losing their self-worth under the shadow of powerful men but the show does not explore this deeply enough, making it seem more like a convenient twist.
Visually, ‘A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder 2’ isn’t as arresting as the first season, even though the fictional town of Little Kilton remains an aesthetic setting with its picturesque old European feel, that juxtaposed with brightly dressed modern teens. The first episode features a fun murder-mystery dress-up party, but the series never fully takes advantage of the setting, neither visually nor as an opportunity to inject some lighter, more entertaining moments before things spiral into darker territory. The soundtrack for the show is really great though, and sometimes the songs tend to overpower the scenes.
The finale of ‘A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder 2’ throws a whole new crime story into the mix, adding an interesting extra layer to the mystery. But because the series is squeezed into just six episodes, the twists involving newly introduced characters feel rushed and emotionally underdeveloped. The show wants Pip’s eventual grief, trauma, and PTSD to land hard in the last episode, but the emotional impact simply feels off.
Perhaps the season would have benefited from focusing entirely on a new standalone case instead of awkwardly stitching it together with lingering threads from the previous mystery. As somebody who has not read the novels, that was the direction I expected ‘A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder 2’ to take anyway. Even so, thriller fans will likely still find enough intrigue here for a decent one-time binge.
Watch A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder 2 on Netflix.
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