Home Before Dark is a sassy new murder mystery series

If you’re sick of every murder mystery having some weird supernatural element, than maybe Home Before Dark is for you.

With her button nose and precociousness, you might mistake Hilde Lisko for any other adorable nine-year-old.

But this nine-year-old, with her determination, smarts and a history of watching All the President’s Men 36 times, could be a pain in the arse. Your pain in the arse if you’ve been up to no good.

The lead character of Apple TV+’s new series Home Before Dark, played by The Florida Project ’s breakout Brooklynn Prince, could be described as a cross between Nancy Drew, Veronica Mars and Harriet the Spy.

Except that she’s based on a real person: Hilde Lysiak, a now-13-year-old American girl who first gained attention as a nine-year-old who outscooped all the grown-ups on a murder investigation in her local town, published in her own newspaper.

The real-life Lysiak has gone on to give college commencement addresses, meet Malala Yousafzai and join a journalists’ society. Mighty impressive for someone who just became a teen.

Strange things

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The fictionalised Hilde has a much more dramatic life.

Home Before Dark takes Lysiak’s biographical details – dad Matt was a reporter for a New York paper who took young Hilde to crime scenes with him while on the job, and she and her two sisters did move with their parents from the Big Apple to her father’s hometown.

The town in the show is aptly named Erie Harbor (because, of course it is) and appears to be predisposed against anyone with the surname Lisko. Matt (Jim Sturgess) left decades earlier and rarely returns – but now out of a job and with nowhere else to go except his father’s house, the whole family ups sticks and moves back.

Hilde is smart, what some adults would say too smart for a kid her age. She says hardboiled truisms such as “They say it’s pretty and perfect but I know nothing is” and “Here, everyone’s hiding everything”. Deep, for a preteen.

But for all her suspicion, world-weariness and decaf coffee-drinking, little Hilde is still an idealist not yet dulled by life’s many compromises. Her belief that truth will win out is endearing.

Jim Sturgess plays dad Matt

Then it’s a good thing that Erie Harbour has so many secrets to uncover, and her father is mixed right up in the middle of the biggest one – the disappearance of the mayor’s son more than 30 years ago.

The death, possible murder, of someone connected to the old crime occurs within hours of the Liskos’ arrival, setting off Hilde’s spider senses – and you just know this curious mind with a strong sense of justice and no boundaries is going to stir up trouble, for herself and for those with something to hide.

Home Before Dark is a cut above middle of the road, though it’s obviously trying to capture some of that compulsive watchability the likes of Riverdale have hit on with its central mystery.

Though, mainly because of its protagonist’s age, it’s not nearly as soapy as Riverdale or the new Nancy Drew, and it’s not supernatural like Riverdale’s strange predecessor, Twin Peaks.

Nancy Drew, junior

The first two episodes are directed by Crazy Rich Asians and In The Heights helmer John M. Chu, and there’s a slickness in how it’s composed, and certainly all the originals Apple TV+ has released has boasted great production values.

It also manages to balance the tone so neither the parents’ plotlines nor the kids’ adventures feels too infantilised or mature.

It’s a very appealing series with a likeable performance from Prince who can swing from confident to vulnerable in a split, and the questions raised in the early episodes certainly invites one to keep coming back, even if it’s unclear whether there’s enough tension to sustain the mystery across 10 hour-long episodes.

It’s certainly a series worth starting if you want a not-too-convoluted murder mystery without supernatural elements, or you like your detectives sassy and precocious.

Home Before Dark is streaming now on Apple TV+

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