The Chalet series recap and review (Netflix)

Netflix

The Chalet, Review

The initial episodes are a little dense with all the different characters, their various relationships to each other, and the multiple non-linear timelines. It’s kind of fun to put it all together though and with everything happening there were some key elements that were smartly buried among more dramatic events.

I honestly totally forgot all about the lottery ticket and was stunned when that turned out to be what the villagers killed the Rodiers for. And while Adèle’s secret identity was a little obvious from the beginning, I never would have suspected Olivier as Julien.

While I understand Julien’s comment that “injustice begets injustice” — that killing Phillipe’s innocent sons and their partners was itself injustice and revenge for the injustices committed against them — it really just turns Julien and Amélie into villains almost as bad as the villagers, especially when you take into account how they used their own partners to infiltrate the village.

Their only virtue is that they didn’t kill for greed. I guess they’re both just insane. I know they wanted to kill all the old villagers, but why kill the old mail man Paul? For the life of me, I can’t see how he was involved at all.

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And the survivors’ complicity at the end really mars those characters as well. Even the good-hearted, well-meaning Manu doesn’t escape untarnished.