Rating: 4 out of 5.
We all want to own a dream home where we can create warm memories of the past and present and cherish them when we get older. It’s home where our heart belongs. The place that once we enter, there is no way back. No other place palpitates our hearts faster than the place that resonates with peace and calm. But what if there’s someone else that has the same affection for what we hold close to our hearts? What then?
The Brannock family is overjoyed. Despite their financial difficulties and lack of sufficient funds, they were able to secure their dream house on 657 Boulevard, in Westfield, New Jersey. Dean (Bobby Cannavale) and Nora Brannock (Naomi Watts) and their children, Ellie (Isabel Gravitt) and Carter (Luke David Blumm) have all that they needed to start afresh. The suburban place is quiet and uneventful. But inside their house is heaven. All the happiness they hoped to experience slowly begins to fade away with the weird, creepy and threatening letters they start to receive – from an individual calling himself ”The Watcher.”
The Watcher claims in his letter that he is put in charge of watching their century-old house that he himself, along with his family were fascinated by. He talks about the ‘young blood’ and asks them the question, who am I? Dean and Nora ask the police to investigate, but nobody seems to care much about the unharmful letters they take it as a prank. However, as more letters are received, the family becomes determined to find out who might be the one stalking them. Their immediate neighbors become primary suspects, but nothing suggests it’s definitely one of them. But will the private investigator shed light on the identity of the stalker, or will the mystery remain unsolved?
Ryan Murphy has already made his name as the best creator of true-crime content. The recent “Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story” is enough to attract anyone’s attention. “American Horror Stories” is another example of how creative his mind can get if he lets all the brilliant ideas fall under his structure. Now, with “The Watcher”, it’s like he is challenging the person himself, the stalker with a message sent to him – ‘You see, I may not know who you are. But I know what you are.’ That alone deserves our respect towards Ryan Murphy who is as skilled as any person who deems himself or herself as brilliant.
As for “The Watcher”, it’s excellent and thought-provoking and invokes all the fears you may get in case you find yourself in the same situation. Also, it captures how helpless the police is with all the technology we have, doing pretty much nothing while the innocent family pulls all the hair out of their head in shock, despair and fear. So embrace yourself for another wild ride of a true crime story that shockingly has evolved without meeting any real challenge from authorities.