The Returned

A&E has done a fine job of remaking the terrific 2012 French series about dead people resuming their place among the living. Far from being a gruesome horror thriller—no zombies here—The Returned is a brain-teasing psycho-philosophical drama packed with intriguing ideas, absorbing characters, and a rich, spooky atmosphere. The setting is transposed from a fantastical mountain community in the Gallic wilderness to the brooding gloom of the Pacific Northwest (the magnificent backdrop is filmed in northern British Columbia), where random inhabitants of a small town who had died years or decades earlier gradually begin to reappear with no memory of their deaths. There's the lone high school girl (India Ennenga) who perished in a school bus tragedy; the nutty wife (Michelle Forbes) who returns to her husband 26 years later; the hunky boyfriend (Mat Vairo) whose arrival makes his grieving girlfriend (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) even more distraught; and the mute little boy (Dylan Kingwell) who may well be the key to the entire unnerving mystery. The show hews closely to the original French series (which has returned for a second season on SundanceTV), up to and including the cliffhanger finale that unfortunately will be dangling forever due to A&E's cancellation of the series. Nevertheless, this bewitchingly entertaining tale is well worth watching. Compiling all 10 episodes from the 2015 sole season, extras include behind-the-scenes featurettes. Recommended. (T. Fry)