Amazon’s Chloe Is a Riveting Twist on the Scammer Show

Becky Green doesn’t want to be Becky Green anymore. She could not be more wrong. She is the protagonist in Chloe, Now streaming on Amazon Prime Video is this study in abjection. Erin Doherty plays the role with protean inscrutability (Crown’s Princess Anne), Becky works a demeaning temp job and lives in a shabby apartment with a mother (Lisa Palfrey) who’s sinking into early-onset dementia. Her escape is social media. It is her escape.
Chloe is then killed in an apparent suicide and Becky finds out that Chloe attempted to phone her ex-friend. Using internet research to fake her way into fancy events, Becky reinvents herself as Sasha Miles, an art-world type fresh off a stint in Tokyo, and infiltrates her late friend’s inner circle. You only need a sophisticated accent and keen social media stalking abilities to make yourself blend in this psychological thriller.
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What will Becky do? The suspense generated by that question alone would be enough to propel viewers through the show’s six tightly edited episodes. The difference? Chloe above the typical prestige mystery is the care it takes in concealing not just the events of the title character’s final night on earth, but also Becky’s own motives. Is she investigating Chloe’s death, or is she indulging a long-running fantasy of becoming Chloe? Do you think she is a heartless, opportunist? Or are her broken thoughts seeking justice in whatever way it takes to get there?
The story takes some genuinely unexpected, yet never ridiculous, turns, each one grounded in Becky’s evolving relationships with Howle’s Elliot, Chloe’s queen-bee best friend Livia (Pippa Bennett-Warner), and their musician buddy Richard (Jack Farthing), who seems to be grieving more intensely than anyone. It is a grifter tale that’s unusually human. Instead of jumping into the mundane subject of sociopathic behaviour, we like Invention of AnnaOr Dirty John, ChloeThis profile is full of depth and authenticity.
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