What to watch: ‘Happy Face’ deserves a stream

There is no spoiler quite like that of a film or television reviewer that intellectualises entertainment and scores a fun or engaging show with a low number. Not every production is meant to be shelved amongst the high-brow and artsy-fartsy top drawer. Many shows can be enjoyed simply by watching them without expectation. Happy Face on Showmax is such a series.

The series is a semi-true but muchly made-up look at the other halves of a serial killer’s life. The family drama and the hurt, pain and manipulation with concomitant dramatic ebbs and flows. The storyline is based on and inspired by the notorious Happy Face killer, Keith Jesperson, and the 2009 biography of his daughter, Melissa Moore, called Shattered Silence.

Records show that Jesperson, a long-haul trucker, strangled his victims. He left a trail of bodies across the United States between 1990 and 1995. He signed his work with smiley faces because someone else claimed his killings at first, though falsely. This is how he earned his nickname.

His known victims, despite his claims of over 160 murders, were sex workers or women living on the fringes of society. The kind who wouldn’t immediately be missed. He was convicted of eight murders and is serving a life sentence in Oregan, United States, for his murder spree. He’ll be eligible for release in 2063.

The smiley face emoji killer

Happy Face was produced by Michelle and Robert King, who also created The Good Wife, The Good Fight and Evil among others. Beyond the story’s initial biographical content in Moore’s book, it was also subdivided into a podcast of 12 parts before Hollywood turned it into part-fact, part-fiction fun.

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Dennis Quaid plays an incarcerated Jesperson who exercises a measure of control over his somewhat estranged daughter Melissa Reed, played by Annaleigh Ashford. Reed has married and lives with her kind, Mr Nice Guy husband and daughter in a leafy suburb. She works as a makeup artist on the Dr Greg Show; a true crime talk show. When the production team finds out, by possible design from Jesperson, that Reed’s dad was the Happy Face killer, attention turns to her and she becomes the star of, and coproducer of a narrative about her dad. It also becomes her own journey into discovering her past.

Watch: Trailer for Happy Face

The plot then thickens when Jesperson starts claiming killings that nobody knew of and, through an elaborate smoke and mirrors escapade, he evidences it. Only, the murder was not his and the happy faces were drawn by conspirators and his lover, to aid the plot. All in the name of making good true crime television.

All in the name of good true crime show

Meanwhile, her teenage daughter Hazel, brattishly well played by Khiyla Aynne, reaches out to grandpa behind everyone’s backs. She’s a somewhat troubled teen and her growing relationship with Jesperson sends mom, dad and daughter on a sidebar collision course. Then, there’s the FBI investigators, the recurring memories of Jesperson’s gifts to his daughter every time he made a kill. There are many layers to the story, and it’s told reasonably and entertainingly well.

And while it’s true that some of the performances are as charismatic as a loaf of bread, that Dennis Quaid’s skills are underutilised in the show and so on, it’s still an entertaining watch. The ponytails and intellectual beards have slammed the show, but it’s not fair. Because nobody’s looking for perfection, just time out on the couch with popcorn.

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