I watched a lot of TV in 2022. So much so that I even hopped on a podcast several times to debate the life and times of fictional characters, including but not limited to platinum-haired mega rich aristocrats with serious family issues and their dragons. It was a good year for storytelling and while prequels and grand series finales were all the rage, small-scale stories had their shine too.
I didn’t know much about Blood Sisters before its release. I just wondered why everyone kept showing me Kate Henshaw’s “Uduak” kissing her son in their Instagram stories. Never imagined this being the social media campaign that would get me on board, but it worked. I watched the show, I enjoyed the show, and I had thoughts.
Blood Sisters finds a young woman less than a day away from marrying a man who physically and emotionally abuses her, suddenly on the run for his murder along with her closest friend. We follow the pair as they try to escape retribution for a crime they can barely explain, evading agents of the man’s family as well as the schemes of his younger brother who actually wanted him dead in the first place. The story delves into interesting yet fairly safe territory as a thriller in the way it explores violence, betrayal and entrapment, as well as in the way it employs thematic dichotomy — there’s a considerable amount of subtext on good and evil; who is truly the victim, and how good can sometimes be evil in disguise — suspense and archetypes as story devices. It establishes its world and its main players in a healthy amount of time, and retains this fairly solid pacing for the majority of the season’s four episodes, which culminates in an engaging climax that feels earned narratively. The one thing I’m not entirely sure it culminates in though, is resolution, as…
I’m left asking “What was it all for?”
Yes, we connect with Ini Dima-Okojie’s “Sarah” and Nancy Isime’s “Kemi” on an emotional level, and yes the story has momentum; however, the character motivations are sometimes confusing; not just because the villains hardly seem to think ahead, but because our beloved duo can’t stop making mistakes. It wasn’t always clear whether the duo really knew how much heat was on them, as they did things the story simply needed them to do to move forward, like carrying a dead body through a camera-filled parking lot. And don’t even get me started on the beheading. What were they thinking? Did the story just need a vehicle to bring the idea of cult activity into all this? Or were dogs digging up a severed head the medicine we never knew we needed? I do think the show brings up cool ideas concerning character archetypes and the politics of being “good” by presenting us with scenarios where the good suffer despite our desire for justice against the malicious and powerful, or even turn to evil in order to blend in for their own safety, but I wish it did more to flesh out the morality of why the supposed good are punished, and what little control people have over their lives despite their expectations, even when they’re as privileged and powerful as Kola’s idiot brother.
Yes, we connect with Ini Dima-Okojie’s “Sarah” and Nancy Isime’s “Kemi” on an emotional level, and yes the story has momentum; however, the character motivations are sometimes confusing; not just because the villains hardly seem to think ahead, but because our beloved duo can’t stop making mistakes.
Maybe the limited allusion to what comes after the final scene is an effect of the story being told as a limited series — this was an effective choice by the way — but I can’t deny that I kept pondering the aftermath. Either way, I loved watching this show and if the producers decide to bless me with said aftermath in the form of a new season, I’ll probably eat it up. The direction and casting were great, and it’s always heartwarming to find Nigerian content of this caliber on Netflix. I just hope no more Kennys needlessly dies for nyash.
