‘The Good Daughter’ Review: Rose Byrne Sizzles in Peacock’s Brutal Trauma-Drama About Crime-Solving Sisters

Peacock‘s latest limited series “The Good Daughter” adds to the streamer’s solid run of women-led thrillers, though it’s best to interpret that label loosely. When stretched to include biographical mysteries, the streak dates back to 2022 with Nancy Oliver’s limited series “Angelyne,” showrun by Allison Miller and starring Emmy Rossum as the enigmatic ’80s era L.A. personality known only by her mononym (until some man decided that’s not good enough). Then came a slight pivot into pulpy book adaptations with “Apples Never Fall” (2024) an adaptation of Lianne “Big Little Lies” Moriarty’s novel of the same name that was showrun by Melanie Marnich and centered around a wealthy family’s missing mom, played by Annette Bening. Not only did “Apples Never Fall” make the perfect amuse-bouche for Peacock’s next whodunit — “All Her Fault” (2025) the Emmy-nominated yet deeply unserious Sarah Snook showcase — it also teed up Jake Lacy, Hollywood’s leading expert in the field of “entitled douchebags,” for a meta-fun Keyser Söze moment as the devil hiding in plain sight (while his wife took on all of their family’s emotional and physical labor). Two less successful entries, by viewership anyway, were this year’s jaunty critical favorite “Ponies,” from co-creator and director Susanna Fogel, which starred Emilia Clarke and Haley Lu Richardson as the CIA’s first female spies operating within the Soviet Union; and the jaundiced “Long Bright River” (2025), a limited series co-created by Liz Moore (who wrote the novel on which it was based) and Nikki Toscano (who served as showrunner), starring Amanda Seyfried as the only cop in a bad/pale part of Philly who cares about neighborhood sex workers and opioid addicts getting killed (one of whom may turn out to be her missing sister). All of these shows share common tropes, despite disparate tones, topics, and objectives — not the least of which are their glorious feminist underpinnings. Within each of these thrillers lurk so many shady husbands, brothers, bosses, and dads. The patriarchy looms large enough to get name-checked, and the leading ladies are all fighting an uphill battle just to be seen, heard, and understood. “All Her Fault” was so attuned to the ways men routinely let down their families Vulture hailed it as a “misandrist masterpiece.” But “Long Bright River” carries the most direct parallels with “The Good Daughter,” both by design and on accident. They’re both gritty and dark. They both follow leads whose careers connect back to their personal demons, and they both track working-class women fighting for their impoverished communities (and against the shitty men who run them). Where “All Her Fault” and “Apples Never Fall” could be carelessly devoured as melodramatic amusements, “Long Bright River” and “The Good Daughter” are too brutal and self-serious to constitute anyone’s idea of a “fun” binge, even if there is a morbid bit of fun to be found in the latter’s performances, dialogue, and many, many character quirks. “The Good Daughter” is set in the fictional town of Pikesville, GA, where Charlie (Meghann Fahy) works as a public defender, adjacent to her sole-surviving parent, town pariah, and private defense attorney, Rusty Quinn (Brendan Gleeson). Her mother, lovingly referred to as Gamma (Olivia Williams), didn’t live long enough to be a grandma; she was murdered in front of her daughters when they were just kids, and the resulting assaults left Charlie’s sister Sam (Rose Byrne) with a lifelong motor speech disorder called dysarthria, as well as impaired vision and a notable limp. Sam is also a lawyer, but she specializes in patent law (to avoid the anxiety that comes with criminal cases) and moved to New York as soon as she was old enough to get out of Georgia. She only returns to Pikeville when Rusty, for the first time, calls to say her sister needs help. Why now? Well, the list of Charlie’s hardships is nearly as long as her sister’s, but Rusty — who tends to speak in Flannery O’Connor quotes — is likely referring to the most recent trauma: a school shooting she witnessed that left the principal and a 13-year-old student dead. Brendan Gleeson and Rose Byrne in ‘The Good Daughter’Courtesy of Mark Hill / Peacock Charlie’s poorly timed visit to the local grade school and a flashback to her mother’s horrific murder take up the first 15 minutes of the premiere, which may be enough to scare off subscribers who tuned in expecting something closer to Peacock’s other thrillers. For those that stick around, “The Good Daughter” steadies itself for the bulk of its six-episode run. Once Sam is back in town, the two sisters start mounting a defense for their dad’s client: the school shooter, Kelly Wilson (Shayna Benardo), an 18-year-old student with an intellectual disability. The maniacal powers that be are eager to kill her — first at the scene of a shooting, where a teacher (played by Jake McDorman) saves her from the trigger-happy cops, and then in court, where a self-righteous district attorney argues for the death penalty, competency laws be damned. They’re all under the Coins’ thumb, a powerful family (with connections throughout the local government) who turned the township against Rusty and his family long ago. Everyone believes Charlie and Sam lied about who killed their mother, and they resent Rusty for defending so many “obviously” guilty parties. The only folks willing to help the Quinns are Rusty’s best friend and legal aide, Lenore (Harper Steele), and Charlie’s husband and assistant district attorney, Ben (Michael Dorman). Otherwise, they’re on their own, standing up for Kelly, standing up to the Coins, and standing against Bad Men™️. Adapted by Karin Slaughter (from her own book) and directed entirely by Steph Green (“Duster,” “Dare Me”), “The Good Daughter” holds back too many revelations for the finale, creating an exposition-heavy ending that covers its bases but functions like an endless list of answers. It’s not as powerful as it needs to be in order to justify its upsetting subject matter, and it’s trauma-drama plotting skews into overkill well before it’s done doling out distress. And yet, I have to say, much of it works. Credit goes to the cast, particularly Byrne and Gleeson, for internalizing their showy character quirks to such a degree that Sam’s limp, vision impairment, and sporadic stutter — yes, also a stutter! — never feel like her defining traits. The same goes for Rusty’s folksy banter, poetry quotes, and even his red-nose routine, in which the professional attorney pops on a clown nose whenever he feels the moment calls for a little levity. Such a strange, impractical choice, deployed as often as it is here, could spoil a curious character who’s always viewed from his children’s removed perspective. Maybe he’s unbelievable, maybe he’s too cute for the rest of the story, maybe he’s simply too silly. But Gleeson gathers it all up to form a heartbroken widower who just wants to give his traumatized children the light they need in an ever-darkening world. Fresh bursts of creative Southern witticisms are similarly rewarding, like hearing Gleeson say, “Never kick a fresh turd on a hot day” or Byrne tell a patronizing windbag “to shit in both hands and start clapping.” The series ultimately rests on Sam and Charlie’s relationship, and their relationship is strong. Their dialogue, particularly when poking fun at one another, rings true, and there’s a buddy-cop dynamic to their investigation that demands to be extended into an ongoing series. Not this series, mind you. Peacock should limit this limited series to its established, er, limits. But I know a streamer where Byrne and Fahy could pitch another thriller centered around two crusading women looking to crack a case, save their souls, and destroy the patriarchy in one fell swoop. Just maybe base the next one on a slightly easier read. Grade: C+ “The Good Daughter” premieres Thursday, November 12 on Peacock. All six episodes will be released at once.