The second season offers a strong drama, starting with a nurse who gets on the way in Castle Rock. Over time, Merrills tries to find answers about some of the issues he faces, and Annie has a nostalgia for a taste of medicine. Maybe Annie needs a new compatibility with her new life.
[Caplan's] performance is masterfully physical, from her carefully impassive smile to the way she holds her arms stiffly at her sides as she walks; the actress embodies a woman who is struggling to control a constant surge of inner turmoil.
I can't tell if the new season is over-reaching, under-reaching or if the Annie Wilkes of it all is just overshadowing the story to an unanticipated degree.
Despite all its high drama, season two feels a little more conventional in its narrative, and that'll likely make for a more satisfying story arc, especially with all the horror-fantasy elements to come.
There's still plenty of King paraphernalia floating around for eagle-eyed viewers to latch onto, but Castle Rock is no longer so insistent of its importance to the overall story. Instead, the series mercifully lets the narrative speak for itself.
Castle Rock Season 2 does a wonderful job of borrowing reoccurring themes from King's massive body of work and splicing them together to make something that appears, at least on its surface, wholly original.
I wish I could tell you about all of the twists and turns this season takes, but that would ruin what is shaping up to be one of the best seasons of television this year.
The show is thoughtfully written by showrunners Sam Shaw and Dustin Thomason, who have a knack for character and an ear for Kingian dialogue, and the gifted cast gives it everything they have.
In its first half...Castle Rock keeps the supernatural elements lurking on the periphery, focusing instead on characters and family melodrama, anchored by Lizzy Caplan's commanding performance at the center.
