Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
Did you love Hotel Beau Séjour? Then you’re going to dig Tabula Rasa, Netflix‘s latest international series. Starring Veerle Baetens, Stijn Van Opstal, and a handful of other talented folks, the supernatural Belgian series follows Annemie “Mie” D’Haeze, a woman who suffers memory loss after a car accident and winds up institutionalized. Now unable to store any new information, she writes down the happenings of her day-to-day life in a diary of sorts, trying to piece her life together and figure out what really happened. If this all wasn’t wild enough, she’s the last person who say Thomas De Geest, a missing man the cops have no leads on. To clear her name, Mie must reconstruct the memories – but not without the interference of some terrifying visions in her very haunted house.
There’s a lot to unpack in Tabula Rasa, but it’s a fascinating, compelling puzzle, one that keeps you guessing and scared all at once. You’ll soon forget you’re reading subtitles and be sucked into all the creepy corners of Mie’s evil home and the people around her who don’t believe a single thing she says about what she’s seeing. Red sand falls from the ceiling and appears in unexpected places, and faceless demons haunt her dreams. Intrigued yet? That’s just the beginning. The first few episodes build the world slowly and deliberately, giving you bits and pieces to lure you towards the chilling things to come.
Watching Mie unlock her own mind is a fascinating and haunting journey, and what works best about the series is its blending of genres. The supernatural aspects are scary, yes, but the psychological components – developments that see our leading lady grapple with her own sanity and fear and trauma – are totally gripping. There are influences of horror, thriller, and tense drama at play here, and while the series may play into some familiar tropes, it’s so well-executed and self-aware that it doesn’t even matter.
Strong performances, eerie visuals, and a rich setting all come together to make a thoroughly entertaining long form horror-thriller. It may test your patience, but Tabula Rasa is the kind of thriller with a huge payoff – one that may very well stick with you long after you’ve finished the 9 episodes.
