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Wall Street Journal

‘The Better Sister' Review: Jessica Biel's Savvy, Soapy Mystery

'No movie gets better after the first five minutes,' a film critic friend once observed, without adding 'Alas.' What about television? Judging by 'The Better Sister,' a series can start out being stupid and obvious and eventually make fun of the stupid and the obvious, all the while upscaling its own genre. Which genre? The multi-part, premium-cable mystery series centered on a female protagonist—or several—with the crimes at hand being subordinate to the relationships, and the relationships bordering on the psychotic. Nicole Kidman and Reese Witherspoon have specialized in these projects—acting, producing or doing both in the likes of 'Big Little Lies,' 'Little Fires Everywhere,' 'The Undoing' and 'The Perfect Couple,' the productions always based on a popular book. The men are feckless, the money abundant. The women are valiant and, even when trashy, sympathetic.