When Poker Face first premiered two years ago, I called it the chillest, coolest show on television. Today, as the second season wraps up in the states and arrives on streaming here in the Nordics, not much has changed. The adventures of Charlie Cale (Natasha Lyonne) have lost none of their charm in the interim.
Joonatan Itkonen
Created by Rian Johnson, the series follows Charlie – a modern-day Columbo with an uncanny ability to spot when someone is lying – as she makes her way through America in her junker car.
Charlie's an odd duck, and the series make a meal of characters pointing out her eccentricities, but she's also an endless source of optimism and good. She helps people because it's the right thing to do, even if she happily skips over a law or fifteen to accomplish this.
Lyonne returns with the same mix of manic and laconic that made Charlie an instant icon. It's a performance that's part pantomime, part imitation, yet uncannily her own. She leans heavily on Columbo-isms, yet you'd never confuse the two. Instead, it feels like an evolution of the archetype told through the jaded Millennial lens.
The same applies for the format, which still toys with the howcatchem-format, meaning we see the crime first, and the rest of the episode is just about how Charlie brings the guilty parties to justice. Happily, it's not all repetition. Instead, season 2 opens the stories up to more grey areas than before. Sometimes, there just isn't a clear guilty party to punish.
That said, not all episodes are made equal, and a few are so unrelentingly dark and tragic that they run out of time to deliver a satisfying conclusion. One story, involving a big box store employee robbing his former place of work, is nearly capsized by a senseless act of violence that never gets the time it deserves.
But when Poker Face works, it is unlike anything else out there. The season opener, The Game is a Foot, is Rian Johnson at his wittiest this side of the Benoit Blanc series. It takes a classic case of murder and stolen identity and muddies the waters with quintuplets, all played by Cynthia Erivo. The result is a zany and wildly inventive series of unfortunate events, one that sets up the season on a high note.
By the end, as Charlie's adventure detours from the episodic format to a larger mythology, reminiscent of how The X-Files told their stories, we get the sense that wherever all this is going, Charlie's quest has only just started. The sudden shift in style won't please everyone, but the addition of new lore and villains is so tantalizing that it's hard to fault Poker Face for reinventing itself.
As a continuation, Poker Face season 2 isn't quite as strong as the first one. There are more just-OK episodes this time around, and even one straight-up dud. But they're balanced by the bangers, which still outweigh the negatives. The inverted Florida Man episode is a highlight, as is the story of an overtly ambitious young sociopath who terrifies Charlie. Each of these offer more than enough laughs and surprises to make up for a few missteps.
It also highlights one of the enduring strengths of this series. The episodic, weekly format is a throwback to a simpler and better time in television. It allows for the same freewheeling energy that makes Charlie such a great hero. You can miss out on a week and still know what's happening because the initial concept is so simple and strong.
Thanks to this, Poker Face remains one of the great delights of modern day TV. It's a joyous event that feels like seeing old friends every time it's on. I'll happily watch it for years and years to come.
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